AREOWS   OF  THE   OH  ACE. 


Tils 


{'■^-y 


l^ritisli    Frrns. 


\RPiO\VS  OF  THE  I'UACE 


A  COLLECTIOX  OF  SCATTERED  LETTERS 
PUBLISHED  CHIEFLY  IX  THE   DAILY  NEWSPAPERS 

1 840  -  1 880. 
BY 

JOHN   RUSKII^,   LL.D.,   D.O.L., 

HONORARY  STUDENT  OF   CHRIST    CHURCH,  AND   HONORARY  FELLOW  OF 
CORPUS  CHRISTI  COLLEGE.  OXFORD, 

AND   NOW   EDITED    BY 

An  Oxford  Pupil. 

with  preface  by  the  author. 

vol  i  -letters  on  art  and  science. 


NEW  YORK : 

JOHN   WILEY   &   SONS, 

15  ASTOR  PLACE. 

1881. 


"I  NE\^R  WROTE  A  LETTER  IN  MY  UFE  WHICH  ALL  THE  WORLD  ARE 

NOT  WELCOME  TO  READ  IF  THEY  WILL." 

'^  '  1    '^  ^  Fora  Clavigera,  Letter  59,  1875. 


S.  W.  Gbekn's  Son, 

Electrotyper,  Printer  and  BInclei> 

74  Beekman  Street, 

2s'ew  York. 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  I. 


PAGE 

Author's  Preface ix 

Editor's  Preface xiii 

Cbuionological  List  of  the  Letters  in  Volume  I      -        -        -  xviii 

Letters  on  Art  : 
I.   Art  Criticism  and  Art  Education. 

"Modern  Painters;"   a  Reply.     1843 3 

Art  Criticism.    1843 10 

The  Arts  as  a  Branch  of  Education.     18")7       -        -        -        -  24 

Art-Teaching  by  Correspondence.     1860        .        .        .        .  32 

n.   Public  Institutions  and  the  National  Gallery. 

Danger  to  tlie  National  Gallery.     1847 37 

The  National  Gallery.     1852 45 

The  British  Museum.     1866 52 

On  the  Purchase  of  Pictures.     1880  55 

IIL   Pre-Raphaelitism, 

^      The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,     1851  (May  13)  .        .        -        59 

The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren.     1851  (May  80)     -        -        -       -    63 


VI 


CONTENTS. 


"The  Light  of  the  World,"  Holman  Hunt.     1854 
"The  Awakening  Conscience,"  Holman  Hunt.     1854 
Pre-Raphaelitism  in  Liverpool.     1858 
Generalization  and  the  Scotch  Pre-Raphaelites.     1858 


PAGE 

67 

.    71 
73 

.    74 


lY.   Turner. 

The  Turner  Bequest.     1856    -        -        -        . 

[Turner's  Sketch  Book.     1858    -        .        . 

The  Turner  Bequest  and  the  National  Galler}', 

The  Turner  Sketches  and  Drawings.     1858 

[The  Liber  Studiorura.     1858 

The  Turner  Gallery  at  Kensington.     1859 

Turner's  Drawings.     1876  (July  5) 

Turner's  Drawings.     1876  (July  19) 

Copies  of  Turner's  Drawings.     1876 

[Copies  of  Turner's  Drawings — Extract.     1857 

[Copy  of  Turner's  Fluelen      .        -        -        . 

"Turners,"  False  and  True.     1871.      - 

The  Character  of  Turner.     1857.     - 

[Thornbury's  Life  of  Turner.     1861. 


1851 


81 
I,  note] 


97,  note] 

-  98 
100 

-  104 
105 

105,  note] 

ibid.] 

106 

107 

108] 


V.  Pictures  and  Astists. 

John  Leech's  Outlines.     1872. 

Ernest  George's  Etchings.     1873. 

The  Frederick  Walker  Exhibition.     187( 


111 
113 
116 


VI.  Architecture  and  Restoration. 

Gothic  Architecture  and  the  Oxford  Museum.     1858. 
Gothic  Architecture  and  the  Oxford  Museum.     1859. 
The  Castle  Rock  (Edinburgh).     1857  (Sept.  14) 
Edinburgh  Castle.     1857  (Sept.  27)      - 
Castles  and  Kennels.     1871  (Dec.  22)       -        -        - 


125 
131 

145 
147 
151 


CONTENTS. 


Vll 


PAGE 

Verona  v.  Warwick.     1871  (Dec.  24)           ....  150 

Notre  Darae  de  Paris.     1871             153 

Mr.  Raskin's  Influence — A  Defence.     1872  (March  15)  154 

Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence — A  Rejoinder.     1872  (March  21)        -  loO 

Modern  Restorations.     1877 157 

Ribbesford  Church.     1877 158 

Circular  relating  to  St.  Mark's,  Venice.     1879.            -  159 

[Letters  relating  to  St.  Mark's,  Venice.     1879.        -        -     169,  note.] 


Letters  on  Science: 
I.  Geological. 

The  Conformation  of  the  Alps.     1864      - 

Concerning  Glaciers.     1864. 

English  versus  Alpine  Greology.     1864     - 

Concerning  Hydrostatics.     1864 

James  David  Forbes:  His  Real  Greatness. 


1874. 


173 
175 
181 
185 
187 


H.  Miscellaneous. 

On  Reflections  in  Water.     1844 

On  the  Reflection  of  Rainbows.     1861 

A  Landslip  Near  Giagnano.     1841 

On  the  Gentian.     1857  .        .        .        . 

On  the  Study  of  Natural  History  (undated) 


191 
201 
202 
204 
204 


AUTHOE'S    PEEFACE. 


My  good  Editor  insists  that  this  book  must  have  an 
Author's  Preface ;  and  insists  further  that  it  shall  not  contain 
compliments  to  him  on  the  editorship.  I  must  leave,  there- 
fore, any  readers  who  care  for  the  book,  and  comprehend  the 
trouble  that  has  been  spent  on  it,  to  pay  him  their  own  com- 
pliments, as  the  successive  service  of  his  notes  may  call  for 
them :  but  my  obedience  to  his  order,  not  in  itself  easy  to 
me,  doubles  the  difficulty  I  have  in  doing  what  nevertheless, 
I  am  resolved  to  do — pay,  that  is  to  say,  several  extremely 
fine  compliments  to  myself,  upon  the  quality  of  the  text. 

For  of  course  I  have  read  none  of  these  letters  since  they 
were  first  printed :  of  half  of  them  I  had  forgotten  the  con- 
tents, of  some,  the  existence ;  all  come  fresh  to  me ;  and  here 
in  Rouen,  where  I  thought  nothing  could  possibly  have  kept 
me  from  drawing  all  I  could  of  the  remnants  of  the  old  town, 
I  find  myself,  instead,  lying  in  bed  in  tlie  morning,  reading 
these  remnants  of  my  old  self — and  that  with  much  content- 
ment and  thankful  applause. 

For  here  are  a  series  of  letters  ranging  over  a  period  of, 
broadly,  forty  years  of  my  life ;  most  of  them  written  hastily, 
and  all  in  hours  snatched   from  heavier  work :    and  in  the 


X  AUTHOR  S    PREFACE. 

entire  mass  of  them  there  is  not  a  word  I  wish  to  change, 
not  a  statement  I  have  to  retract,  and,  I  believe,  few  pieces 
of  advice,  which  the  reader  will  not  iind  it  for  his  good  to  act 
npon. 

With  which  brief  preface  I  am,  for  my  own  part,  content ; 
l)ut  as  it  is  one  of  an  unusual  tenor,  and  may  be  thought  by 
some  of  my  friends,  and  all  my  foes,  more  candid  than 
graceful,  I  permit  myself  the  apologetic  egotism  of  enforcing 
one  or  two  of  the  points  in  which  I  find  these  letters  so  well 
worth — their  author's — reading. 

In  the  building  of  a  large  book,  there  are  always  places 
where  an  indulged  diffuseness  weakens  the  fancy,  and  pro- 
longed strain  subdues  the  energy :  when  we  have  time  to  say 
all  we  wish,  we  usually  wish  to  say  more  than  enough  ;  and 
there  are  few  subjects  we  can  have  the  pride  of  exhausting, 
without  wearying  the  listener.  But  all  these  letters  were 
wi'itten  with  fully  provoked  zeal,  under  strict  allowance  of 
space  and  time:  they  contain  the  choicest  and  most  needful 
things  I  could  within  narrow  limits  say,  out  of  many  con- 
tending to  be  said;  expressed  with  deliberate  precision;  and 
recommended  by  the  best  art  I  had  in  illustration  or  emphasis. 
At  the  time  of  my  life  in  which  most  of  them  were  composed, 
T  was  fonder  of  metaphor,  and  more  fertile  in  simile,  than  I 
am  now;  and  I  employed  both  with  franker  trust  in  the 
reader's  intelligence.  Carefully  chosen,  they  are  always  a 
powerful  means  of  concentration ;  and  I  could  then  dismiss 
ill  six  words,  "  thistledown  without  seeds,  and  bubbles  without 
color,"  forms  of  art  on  which  I  should  now  perhaps  spend 
half  a  page  of  analytic  vituperation ;  and  represent,  with  a 
pleasant  accuracy  which  my  best  methods  of  outline  and 
exposition  could  now  no  more  achieve,  the  entire  system  of 
modern   plutocratic   ])olicy,   under    the   luckily   remembered 


AUTHOR  S    PREFACE.  XI 

image  of  the  Arabian  bridegroom,  bewitched  with  his  heels 
uppermost. 

It  is  to  be  remembered  also  that  many  of  the  subjects 
handled  can  be  more  conveniently  treated  controversially  than 
directly ;  the  answer  to  a  single  question  may  be  made  clearer 
than  a  statement  which  endeavors  to  anticipate  many  ;  and  the 
crystalline  vigor  of  a  truth  is  often  best  seen  in  the  course  of  its 
serene  collision  with  a  trembling  and  dissolving  fallacy.  But 
there  is  a  deeper  reason  than  any  such  accidental  ones  for  the 
quality  of  this  book.  Since  the  letters  cost  me,  as  aforesaid, 
much  trouble;  since  they  interrupted  me  in  pleasant  work 
which  was  usually  liable  to  take  harm  by  interruption ;  and 
since  they  were  likely  almost,  in  the  degree  of  their  force,  to 
be  refused  by  the  editors  of  the  adverse  journals,  I  never  was 
tempted  into  w^riting  a  word  for  the  public  press,  unless  con- 
cerning matters  w^hich  I  had  much  at  heart.  And  the  issue 
is,  therefore,  that  the  two  following  volumes  contain  very 
nearly  the  indices  of  everyt^iing  I  have  deeply  cared  for 
during  the  last  forty  years ;  while  not  a  few  of  their  political 
notices  relate  to  events  of  more  profound  historical  impor- 
tance than  any  others  that  have  occurred  during  the  period 
they  cover ;  and  it  has  not  been  an  uneventful  one. 

!N"or  have  the  events  been  w^ithout  gravity ;  the  greater, 
because  they  have  all  been  inconclusive.  Their  tnie  conclu- 
sions are  perhaps  nearer  than  any  of  us  apprehend  ;  and  the 
pai-t  I  may  be  forced  to  take  in  them,  though  I  am  old, — 
perhaps  I  should  rather  say,  hecause  I  am  old, — will,  as  far  as 
I  can  either  judge  or  resolve,  be  not  merely  literary. 

Whether  I  am  spared  to  put  into  act  anything  here  designed 
for  my  country's  help,  or  am  shielded  by  death  from  the  sight 
of  her  remediless  sorrow,  I  have  already  done  for  her  as  much 
service  as  she  has  will  to  receive,  by  laying  before  her  facts 


Xll 

vital  to  her  existence,  and  unalterable  by  her  power,  in  words 
of  wliicli  not  one  has  been  warped  by  interest  nor  weakened 
by  fear ;  and  which  are  as  pure  from  selfish  passion  as  if  they 
were  spoken  already  out  of  another  world. 

J.  RusKm. 
Rouen,  St.  Firmin's  Day,  1880. 

i 


EDITOR'S    PREFACE. 


Some  words  are  needed  by  way  of  a  general  note  to  the 
present  volumes  in  explanation  of  the  principles  upon  which 
they  have  been  edited.  It  is,  however,  first  due  to  the  com- 
piler of  the  Bibliography  of  Mr.  Ruskiu's  writings,"^  to  state  in 
what  measure  this  book  has  been  prompted  and  assisted  by  his 
previous  labors.  Already  acquainted  with  some  few  of  the 
letters  which  Mr.  Ruskiu  had  addressed  at  various  times  to  the 
different  organs  of  the  daily  press,  or  which  had  indirectly 
found  their  way  there,  it  was  not  until  I  came  across  the 
Bibliography  that  I  was  encouraged  to  complete  and  arrange  a 
collection  of  these  scattered  portions  of  his  thought.  When  I 
had  done  this,  I  ventured  to  submit  the  whole  number  of  the 
letters  to  their  author,  and  to  ask  him  if,  after  taking  two  or 
three  of  tliem  as  examples  of  the  rest,  he  would  not  consider 
the  advisability  of  himself  republishing,  if  not  all,  at  least  a 
selected  few.  In  reply,  he  was  good  enough  to  put  me  in 
communication  with  his  publisher,  and  to  request  me  to  edit 
any  or  all  of  the  letters  without  further  reference  to  him. 

I  have,  therefore,  to  point  out  that  except  for  that  request, 
or  rather  sanction ;  for  the  preface  which  he  has  promised  to 

*"The  Bibliography  of  Ruskin:  a  bibliographical  list,  arranged  in 
chronological  order,  of  the  published  writings  of  John  Ruskin,  M.A. 
(From  1834  to  1879.)"     By  Ricli.ird  ITcrne  Shepherd. 


xiv  editor's  preface. 

add  after  my  work  upon  the  volumes  is  finished  ;  and  for  the 
title  which  it  bears,  Mr.  Kuskin  is  in  no  way  responsible  for 
this  edition  of  his  letters.  I  knew,  indeed,  from  the  words  of 
"  Fors  Clavigera"  which  are  printed  as  a  motto  to  the  book, 
that  I  ran  little  risk  of  his  disapproval  in  determining  to  print, 
not  a  selection,  but  the  whole  number  of  letters  in  question ; 
and  I  felt  certain  that  the  completeness  of  the  collection  would 
be  considered  a  first  essential  by  most  of  its  readers,  who  are 
thus  assured  that  the  present  volumes  contain,  with  but  two 
exceptions,  every  letter  mentioned  in  the  last  edition  of  the 
bibliography,  and  some  few  more  beside,  which  have  been 
either  printed  or  discovered  since  its  publication. 

The  two  exceptions  are,  first,  the  series  of  letters  on  the 
Lord's  Prayer  which  appeared  in  the  pages  of  the  Contem- 
porary Revieic  last  December;  and,  secondly,  some  half-dozen 
upon  "A  Museum  or  Picture  Gallery,"  printed  in  the  Ai't 
Journal  of  last  June  and  August.  It  seemed  that  both  these 
sets  of  letters  were  really  more  akin  to  review  articles  cast  in 
an  epistolary  form,  and  would  thus  find  fitter  place  in  a  collec- 
tion of  such  papers  than  in  the  present  volumes ;  and  for  the 
omission  of  the  second  set  there  was  a  still  further  reason  in 
the  fact  that  the  series  is  not  yet  completed.*  On  the  other 
hand,  the  recent  circular  on  the  proposed  interference  with 
St.  Mark's,  Venice,  is  included  in  the  first,  and  one  or  two 

*  The  letter  out  of  which  it  took  its  rise,  however,  will  be  found  on  the 
82d  page  of  the  first  volume ;  and  with  regard  to  it,  and  especially  to  the 
mention  of  Mr.  Frith's  picture  in  it,  reference  should  be  made  to  part  of  a 
further  letter  in  the  Art  Journal  of  this  month. 

"  I  owe  some  apology,  by  the  way,  to  Mr.  Frith,  for  the  way  I  spoke  of 
his  picture  in  ray  letter  to  the  Leicester  committee,  not  intended  for  publi- 
cation, though  I  never  write  what  I  would  not  allow  to  be  published,  and 
was  glad  that  they  asked  leave  to  print  it."  {Art  Journal,  August,  1880, 
where  this  sentence  is  further  explained.) 


EDITOR  S    PREFACE.  XV 

other  extraneous  matters  in  the  t^ecoiul  vohiine,  for  reasons 
which  their  connection  witli  the  letter.s  amongst  which  they 
are  placed  will  make  sufficiently  clear. 

The  letters  are  reprinted  word  fur  word,  and  almost  stop 
for  stop,  from  the  newspapers  and  other  pages  in  which  they 
first  appeared.  To  ensure  this  accuracy  was  not  an  easy  mat- 
ter, and  to  it  there  are  a  few  intentional  exceptions.  A  few 
misprints  have  been  corrected,  such  as  that  of  "  Fat  Bard  "  for 
Fort  Bard"  (vol  i.  p.  IttT) ;  and  now  and  then  the  punctua- 
tion has  been  changed,  as  on  the  256th  page  of  the  same 
volume,  where  a  comma,  placed  in  the  original  print  of  the 
letter  between  the  words  "  visibly"  and  '"  owing,"  quite  con- 
fused the  sentence.  To  these  slight  alterations  may  be  added 
others  still  less  important,  such  as  the  commencement  of  a 
fresh  paragraph,  or  the  closing  up  of  an  existing  one,  to  suit 
the  composition  of  the  type,  which  the  number  of  notes  ren- 
dered unusually  tiresome.  The  title  of  a  letter,  too,  is  not 
always  that  provided  it  by  the  newspaper ;  in  some  cases  it 
seemed  well  to  rechristen,  in  others  it  was  necessary  to  christen 
a  letter,  though  the  former  has  never  been  done  where  it  was 
at  all  possible  that  the  existing  title  (for  which  reference  can 
always  be  made  to  the  bibliography)  was  one  given  to  it  by 
Mr.  Ruskin  himself. 

The  classification  of  the  letters  is  well  enough  shown  by  the 
tables  of  contents.  The  advantages  of  a  topical  over  a  chrono- 
logical arrangement  appeared  beyond  all  doubt ;  whilst  the 
addition  to  each  volume  of  a  chronological  list  of  the  letters 
contained  in  it,  and  the  further  addition  to  the  second  volume 
of  a  similar  list  of  all  the  letters  contained  in  the  book,  and  of 
a  full  index,  will,  it  is  hoped,  increase  the  usefulness  of  the 
work. 

The  beautiful  engraving  which  forms  the  frontispiece  of 


xvi  editor's  preface. 

the  first  volume  originally  formed  that  of  "  The  Oxford 
Museum."  The  plate  was  but  little  used  in  the  apparently 
small  edition  of  that  book,  and  was  thus  found  to  be  in  excel- 
lent state  for  further  use  here.  The  woodcut  of  the  chestnut 
spandril  (vol.  i.  p.  144)  is  copied  from  one  which  may  also  be 
found  in  "  The  Oxford  Museum."  The  facsimile  of  part  of 
one  of  the  letters  is  not  quite  satisfactory,  the  lines  being  some- 
what thicker  than  they  should  be,  but  it  answers  its  present 
purpose. 

Lastly,  the  chief  difficulty  of  editing  these  letters  has  been 
in  regard  to  the  notes,  and  has  lain  not  so  much  in  obtaining 
the  necessary  information  as  in  deciding  w^hat  use  to  make  of 
it  when  obtained.  The  first  point  was,  of  course,  to  put  the 
reader  of  the  present  volumes  in  possession  of  every  fact  which 
would  have  been  common  knowledge  at  the  time  when  such 
and  such  a  letter  was  written ;  but  beyond  this  there  were 
various  allusions,  which  might  be  thought  to  need  explanation  ; 
quotations,  the  exact  reference  to  which  might  be  convenient ; 
and  so  forth.  Some  notes,  therefore,  of  this  character  have 
been  also  added  ;  whilst  some  few  which  were  omitted,  either 
intentionally  or  by  accident,  from  the  body  of  the  work,  may 
be  found  on  reference  to  the  index.* 

The  effort  to  make  the  book  complete  has  induced  the  notice 
of  slight  variations  of  text  in  one  or  two  cases,  especially  in  the 
reprint  of  the  St.  Mark's  Circular.  The  space  occupied  by 
such  notes  is  small,  the  interest  which  a  few  students  take  in 
the  facts  they  notice  really  great,  and  the  appearance  of 
pedantry  to  some  readers  is  thus  risked  in  order  to  meet  the 

*  Some  of  the  notes,  it  will  be  remarked,  are  in  larger  type  than  the 
rest;  these  are  Mr.  Ruskin's  original  notes  to  the  letters  as  first  published, 
and  are  in  fact  part  of  them;  and  they  are  so  printed  to  distinguish  them 
from  the  other  notes,  for  \vliicli  I  am  responsible. 


EDITOR  S    PREFACE.  Xvii 

special  wish  of  othei-s.  The  same  effort  will  account  for  the 
reappearance  of  one  or  two  really  unimportant  letters  in 
the  Appendix  to  the  second  volume,  which  contains  also  some 
few  letters  the  nature  of  which  is  rather  personal  than  public. 
I  have  asked  Mr.  Ruskin  to  state  in  his  preface  to  the  book 
the  value  he  may  set  upon  it  in  relation  to  his  other  and  more 
connected  work ;  and  for  the  rest,  I  have  only  to  add  that  the 
editing  of  it  has  been  the  pleasant  labor  of  my  leisure  for  moi-e 
than  two  years  past,  and  to  express  my  hope  that  these  scattered 
arrows,  some  from  the  bow  of  ''An  Oxford  Graduate,"  some 
from  that  of  an  Oxford  Professor,  may  not  have  been  vainly 
winged  anew  by 

An  Oxford  Pupil. 
October,  1880. 


OimONOLOGICAL   LIST   OF   THE   LETTERS 

Note. — In  the  second  and  tliird  columns  the  l/racTceted  woi'ds  and  figures  are 

dating  of 


TiTiiK  OF  Letter. 


Where  Written. 


A  Landslip  near  Giagnano     . 
Modern  Painters:  a  Reply     . 

Art  Criticism 

On  Reflections  in  Water 
Danger  to  the  National  Gallery 
Tiie  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,  1. 
The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,  II. 
The  National  Gallery  .... 
"  The  Light  op  the  World"  . 
"  The  Awakening  Conscience" 
The  Turner  Bequest       .... 

On  the  Gentian 

The  Turner  Bequest  &  National  Gallery 

The  Castle  Rock  (Edinburgh) 

The  Arts  as  a  Branch  of  Education.    . 

Edinburgh  Castle 

The  Character  of  Turner     . 
Pre-Raph.\elitism  in  Liverpool     . 
Generalization  &  Scotch  Pre-Raphaelites 
Gothic  Architecture  &  Oxford  Museum,  I. 
The  Turner  Sketches  and  Drawings    . 
Turner's  Sketch  Book  (extract)    . 
The  Liber  Studiorum  (extract)     . 
Gothic  Architecture  and  Oxford  Mus.,  II 
The  Turner  Gallery  at  Kensington   . 
Mr:  Thornbury's  "  Life  of  Turner"  (extract) 
Art  Teaching  by  Correspondence 
On  the  Reflection  of  Rainbows    . 
The  Conformation  of  the  Alps     . 
Concerning  Glaciers      .... 
English  versus  Alpine  Geology 
Concerning  Hydrostatics 
The  British  Museu-^i         .... 
Copies  of  Turner's  Drawings  (extract) 
Notre  Dame  de  Paris      .... 
"  Turners"  False  AND  True    . 
Castles  and  Kennels       .... 

Verona  v,  Warwick 

Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence  :  a  Defence 
Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence:  a  Rejoinder  . 
John  Leech's  Outlines    .... 
Ernest  George's  Etchings 
James  David  Forbes:  his  Real  Greatness 
The  Frederick  Walker  Exhibition 
Copies  of  Turner's  Drawings 

Turner's  Drawings,  I 

Turner's  Drawings,  II 


Modern  Restoration 
Ribbesford  Church 


St.  Mark's  Venice — Circular  RELATiNfi  to 
St.  Mark's  Venice — Letters  . 
On  the  Purchase  of  Pictures 
Copy  OF  Turner's  "  Fluelen" 
The  Study  of  Natural  History     . 


Naples  . 

Denmark  Hill 

Denmark  Hill 

Denmark  Hill 

Denmark  Hill]    . 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Heme  Hill,  Dulwich 
Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill      . 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill 
Dunbar 
Penrith 
Penrith 


Denmark  Hill 
Lucerne 
Denmark  Hill 


t 


S.  E. 


enmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Norwich 
Denmark  Hill 

! Denmark  Hill 
)enmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill, 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 

Denmark  Hill 


Peterborough     • . 
Brantwood    . 
Brantwood,  Coniston, 

Lancashire 
Venice    . 
Brantwood,  Coniston, 

Lancashire 
"Brantwood  . 
Brantwood  . 
_B  rant  wood  . 
L.ondon 
[  ] 


CONTAINED   IN   THE   FIKST   A^OLUME. 

more  or  less  certainly  conjectured ;  ^chiht  those  unbracketed  give  tJie  actual 
the  letter. 


Whzn  Wrtttkn. 


February  7,  1841  , 
About  Sept.  17,  1843] 
December.  1843]  . 
January,  1844]      .    ^ 
Jauuarv  6  [1847]  . 
May  9  [iSol] 
May  26  [1851]       . 
December  27  [1852] 
May  4  [1854] 
May  24  [1854]       . 
October  27  [1856] 
February  10  [1857] 
July  8,  1857] 
14th  September,  1857 
September  25,  1857 
27tli  September  [1857] 

1857] 
January,  1858] 
March,  1858] 
June,  1858]  . 
November.  1858] . 
1858  . 
1858  . 
January  20,  1859  . 
October  20  [1859] 
December  2,  1861 
November.  1860    . 
7th  .Alay,  1861 
10th  November,  1864 
November  21  [1864] 
29th  November  [1864] 
5th  December  [1864] 
Jan.  26  [1866] 

]  1867  . 
January  18,  1871 
January  23  [1871 
December  20  [1871]      . 
24th  (for  25th)  Dec.  [1871] 
March  15  [1872] 
March  21  [1872" 

1872' 
December,  1873] 

1874] 
January,  1876] 
April  23  [1876] 
July  3  [1876] 
July  16  [1876] 

15th  April,  1877 
July  24,  1877 

Winter  1879] 
Winter  1879] 
January,  18807 
20th  March,  1880. 
Uodated 


Where  and  when  first  Pt^ushed. 


Proceedings  of  the  Ashmolean  Society 

The  Weekly  Chronicle,  Sept.  23,  1843 

T?ie  Artist  and  Amateur's  Magazine,  1844 

The  Artist  and  Amateur's  Magazine,  1844 

rA«  r/wd5,  January  7,  1847 

The  Times,  May  13,  1851    . 

The  Times,  May  30,  1851  . 

The  Times,  December  29,  1852  . 

The  Times,  :May  15,  1854  .         .       -  . 

The  Times,  :\Iay  25,  1854  . 

The  Times,  October  28,  1856     . 

The  Athena  am,  February  14,  1857    . 

The  Times,  July  9.  1857    . 

The  Witness  (Edinburgh),  Sept.  16,  1857 

"New  Oxford  Examinations,  etc.,"  1858 

The  Witness  (Edinburgh),  Sept.  30,  1857 

Thornbury's  Life  of  Turner.  Preface,  1861 

1  he  Liverpool  Albion,  January  11,  1858     . 

The  Witness  (Edinburgh).  :March  27,  1858 

"The  Oxford  Museum,"  1859  . 

The  Literary  Gazette,  Nov.  13,  1858 

List  of  Turner's  Drawings,  Boston,  1874 . 

List  of  Turner's  Drawings,  Boston,  1874 . 

"The  Oxford  Museum,"  1859  . 

The  Times,  October  21,  1859     . 

Thornbury's  Life  of  Turner.     Ed.  2,  Prcf. 

Nature  and  Art,  December  1,  1866   . 

The  London  Review,  ]\[af  16,  1861     . 

The  Reader,  November  12,  1864 

The  Reader,  November  26,  1864 

The  Reader,  December  3,  1864 

The  Reader,  December  10.  1864 

The  Times,  January  27,  1866     . 

List  of  Turner's  Drawings,  Boston,  1874  . 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  January  19,  1871     . 

The  Times,  January  24,  1871    . 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  December  22,  1871  . 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  December  25.  1871 . 

The  Fall  Mall  Gazette,  March  16,  1872      . 

The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  March  21,  1872      . 

The  Catalogue  to  the  Exhibition,  1872 

The  Architect,  Bccemher  27,  1873     . 

"  Rendu's  Glaciers  of  Savoy,"  1874. 

The  Times,  January  20,  1876     . 

The  Tinus,  April  25.  1876 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  July  5,  1876    . 

TJte  Daily  Telegraph,  July  19,  1876  . 

The  Liverpool  Daily  Post,  June  9,  1877      . 
The  Kidderminster  Times,  July  28,  1877  . 


Page. 

;202 
I     3 

10 
191 

37 

59 

63 

45 

67 

71 

81 
204 

86 
145    • 

24 
147 
107 

73 

74 
125 
I  88 

mil. 

I  97  n. 
131 
98 
108 
1  32 
,201 
173 
175 
181 
185 
I  52 
;i05n. 
|l53 
[106 
151 
152 
154 
156 
111 
113 
187 
'116 
105 
;100 
104 

157 
158 


See  the  Circular 159 

Birmingham  Daily  MaiK  Nov.  27.  1879     .  169 

Leicester  Chronicle,  January  31,  1880  55 

Lithograph  copy  issued  by  Mr.  Ward.  1H80  105  n. 

Letter  to  Adam  White  [unknown].  .  204 


LETTERS   ON  ART. 


L 

ART   CRITICISM  AND   ART  EDUCATION. 

"Modern  Painters";    A  Reply.    1843. 
Art  Criticism.    1843. 

The  Arts  as  a  Branch  of  Education.    1857. 
Art  Teaching  by  Correspondence.    1860, 


ARROWS  OJUIHE  CHACE. 


ART    CRITICISM   AJND    ART    EDUCATION. 

[From  "  The  Weekly  Chronicle,"  September  ^i,  1843.] 

''MODERN  PA JNTEBS";  A  REPLY. 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Weekly  Chronicler 

Sir  :  I  was  mucli  gratified  by  reading  in  your  columns  of 
the  15tli""  instant  a  piece  of  close,  candid,  and  artistical 
criticism  on  my  work  entitled  "Modern  Painters."  Serious 
and  well-based  criticism  is  at  the  present  day  so  rare,  and  our 
periodicals  are  tilled  so  universally  with  the  splenetic  jargon  or 
meaningless  praise  of  ignorance,  that  it  is  no  small  pleasure  to 
an  author  to  meet  either  with  praise  which  he  can  view  with 
patience,  or  censure  which  he  can  regard  with  respect.  I  sel- 
dom, therefore,  read,  and  have  never  for  an  instant  thought  of 
noticing,  the  ordinary  animadversions  of  the  press ;  but  the 
critique  on  '*  Modern  Painters  "  in  your  pages  is  evidently  the 
work  of  a  man  both  of  knowledge  and  feeling  ;  and  is  at  once 
so  candid  and  so  keen,  so  honest  and  so  subtle,  that  I  am 
desirous  of  offering  a  few  remarks  on  the  points  on  which  it 
principally  touches — they  are  of  importance  to  art ;  and  I  feci 
convinced  that  the  writer  is  desirous  only  of  elucidating  tnith, 
not  of  upholding  a  favorite  error.  With  respect  first  to  Gaspar's 
painting  of  the  "  Sacrifice  of  Isaac."  It  is  not  on  the  faith  of 
any  shujie  shadow  that  I  have  pronounced  the  time  intended  to 

*  It  should  be  16lh,  the  criticism  having  appeared  in  the  precediug  weekly 
issue. 


4  LETTERS   OJ?"   ART.  [1843, 

be  near  noon  * — though  the  shadow  of  the  two  figures  being 
very  short,  and  csistf  ro?n  the  spectator,  is  in  itself  conclusive. 
The  whole  system  of  chiaroscuro  of  the  picture  is  lateral ;  and 
the  light  is  expressly  shown  not  to  come  from  the  distance  by 
its  breaking  brightly  on  the  bit  of  rock  and  waterfall  on  the 
left,  from  which  the  high  copse  wood  altogether  intercepts  the 
rays  proceeding  from  the  horizon.  There  are  multitudes  of 
pictures  by  Gaspar  with  this  same  effect — leaving  no  doubt 
whatever  on  my  mind  that  they  are  all  manufactured  by  the 
same  approved  recipe,  probably  given  him  by  Nicholas,  but 
worked  out  by  Gaspar  with  the  clumsiness  and  vulgarity  which 
are  invariably  attendant  on  the  efforts  of  an  inferior  mind  to 
realize  the  ideas  of  a  greater.  The  Italian  masters  universally 
make  the  horizon  the  chief  light  of  their  picture,  whether  the 
effect  intended  be  of  noon  or  evening.  Gaspar,  to  save  him- 
self the  trouble  of  graduation,  washes  his  sky  half  blue  and  half 
yellow,  and  separates  the  two  colors  by  a  line  of  cloud.  In 
order  to  get  liis  light  conspicuous  and  clear,  he  washes  the  rest 
of  his  sky  of  a  dark  deep  blue,  without  any  thoughts  about 
time  of  day  or  elevation  of  sun,  or  any  such  minutiae ;  finally, 
having  frequently  found  the  convenience  of  a  black  foreground, 
with  a  bit  of  light  coming  in  round  the  corner,  and  probably 
having  no  conception  of  the  possibility  of  painting  a  foreground 
on  any  other  principle,  he  naturally  falls  into  the  usual  method 
— blackens  it  all  over,  touches  in  a  few  rays  of  lateral  light,  and 
turns  out  a  very  respectable  article  ;  for  in  such  language  only 
should  we  express  the  completion  of  a  picture  painted  through- 
out on  conventional  principles,  without  one  reference  to  nature, 
and  witliout  one  idea  of  the  painter's  own.  With  respect  to 
Salvator's  "  Mercury  and  the  AVoodman,"  f  your  critic  has  not 

*  See  "Modern  Painters,"  vol.  i.  p.  159  (Pt.  II.  §  2,  cap.  2.  §  5). 
"  Again,  take  any  important  group  of  trees,  I  do  not  care  whose, — Claude's, 
Salvator's,  or  Poussin's, — with  lateral  light  (that  in  the  Marriage  of  Isaac 
and  Rebecca,  or  Caspar's  Sacrifice  of  Isaac,  for  instance);  can  it  be  supposed 
that  those  murky  browns  and  melancholy  greens  are  representative  of  the 
tints  of  leaves  under  full  noonday  sun?"  The  picture  in  question  is,  it  need 
hardly  be  said,  in  the  National  Gallery  (No.  31). 

+  See  "  Modern  Painters,"  vol.  i.  pp.  157-8  (Pt.  II.  §  ii.,  cap.  2,  § 4).     The 


1843.]  ''MODERN    painters";    A    KEI'LY.  5 

allowed  for  the  effect  of  time  on  its  blues.  They  are  now,  in 
deed,  sobered  and  brought  down,  as  is  every  other  color  in  the 
picture,  until  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  distinguish  any  of  the 
details  in  its  darker  parts;  but  they  have  been  pure  and  clean, 
and  the  mountain  is  absolutely  the  same  color  as  the  open 
part  of  the  sky.  When  I  say  it  is  ''in  full  light,''  I  do  not 
mean  that  it  is  the  highest  light  of  the  picture  (for  no  distant 
mountain  can  be  so,  when  compared  with  bright  earth  or  white 
clouds),  but  that  no  accidental  shadow  is  cast  upon  it ;  that  it  is 
under  open  sky,  and  so  illumined  that  there  must  necessarily 
1)0  a  dilference  in  hue  between  its  light  and  dark  sides,  at  which 
Salvator  has  not  even  hinted. 

Again,  with  respect  to  the  Cjuestion  of  focal  distances,"^ 
your  critic,  in  common  witli  many  very  elever  people  to  whom 
I  have  spoken  on  the  subject,  has  confused  the  obscurity  of 
objects  which  are  laterally  out  of  the  focal  range,  with  that 
of  objects  which  are  directly  out  of  the  focal  distance.  If  all 
objects  in  a  landscape  were  in  the  same  plane,  they  should  be 
represented  on  the  plane  of  the  canvas  with  equal  distinct- 
ness, because  the  eye  has  no  greater  lateral  range  on  the  canvas 
than  in  the  landscape,  and  can  only  command  a  point  in  each. 
But  this  point  in  the  landscape  may  present  an  intersection  of 
lines  belono^ing:  to  different  distances — as  when  a  branch  of  a 

critic  of  the  Chronicle  had  written  that  the  rocky  mountains  in  this  picture 
"  are  /lo^  sky-blue,  neither  are  they  near  enough  for  detail  of  crag  to  be  seen, 
neither  are  they  in  full  light,  but  are  quite  as  indistinct  as  they  would  be 
in  nature,  and  just  the  color."  The  picture  is  No.  84  in  the  National 
Gallery. 

*  See  "  Modern  Painters,"  vol.  i.  p.  184  (Pt.  II.  §  ii.,  cap.  4.  §  G).  "  Turner 
introduced  a  new  era  in  landscape  art,  by  showing  that  the  foreground 
might  be  sunk  for  the  distance,  and  that  it  was  possible  to  express  immediate 
proximity  to  the  spectator,  without  giving  anything  like  completeness  to  the 
forms  of  the  near  objects.  This,  observe,  is  not  done  by  slurred  or  soft 
lines  (always  the  sign  of  vice  in  art),  but  by  a  decisive  imperfection,  a  firm 
but  partial  assertion  of  form,  which  the  eye  feels  indeed  to  be  close  home  to 
it,  and  yet  cannot  rest  upon,  nor  cling  to,  nor  entirely  understand,  and  from 
which  it  is  driven  away  of  necessity  to  those  parts  of  distance  on  which  it 
is  intended  to  repose."  To  this  the  critic  of  the  Chmmde  had  objected, 
attempting  ta  show  that  it  would  result  in  Nature  lieing  "  represented  wiih 
just  half  the  quantity  of  light  and  color  that  she  possesses." 


6  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1843. 

tree,  or  tuft  of  grass,  cuts  against  the  horizon :  and  yet  these 
different  distances  cannot  be  discerned  together :  we  lose  one  if 
we  look  at  the  other,  so  that  no  painful  intersection  of  lines  is 
ever  felt.  But  on  the  canvas,  as  the  lines  of  foreground  and 
of  distance  are  on  the  same  plane,  they  will  be  seen  together 
whenever  they  intersect,  painfully  and  distinctly ;  and,  there- 
fore, unless  we  make  one  series,  whether  near  or  distant, 
obscure  and  indefinite,  we  shall  always  represent  as  visible  at 
once  that  which  the  eye  can  only  perceive  by  two  separate  acts 
of  seeing.  Hold  up  your  finger  before  this  page,  six  inches 
from  it.  If  you  look  at  the  edge  of  your  finger,  you  cannot 
see  the  letters ;  if  you  look  at  the  letters,  you  cannot  see  the 
edge  of  your  finger,  but  as  a  confused,  double,  misty  line. 
Hence  in  painting,  you  must  either  take  for  your  subject  the 
finger  or  the  letters ;  you  cannot  paint  both  distinctly  without 
violation  of  truth.  It  is  of  no  consequence  how  quick  the 
change  of  the  eye  may  be ;  it  is  not  one  whit  quicker  than  its 
change  from  one  part  of  the  horizon  to  another,  nor  are  the 
two  intersecting  distances  more  visible  at  the  same  time  than 
two  opposite  portions  of  a  landscape  to  which  it  passes  in  suc- 
cession. Whenever,  therefore,  in  a  landscape,  we  look  from 
the  foreground  to  the  distance,  the  foreground  is  subjected  to 
two  degrees  of  indistinctness :  the  first,  that  of  an  object 
laterally  out  of  the  focus  of  the  eye  ;  and  the  second^  that  of 
an  object  directly  out  of  the  focus  of  the  eye ;  being  too  near 
to  be  seen  with  the  focus  adapted  to  the  distance.  In  the  pic- 
ture, when  we  look  from  the  foreground  to  the  distance,  the 
foreground  is  subjected  only  to  one  degree  of  indistinctness, 
that  of  being  out  of  the  lateral  range ;  for  as  both  the  painting 
of  the  distance  and  of  the  foreground  are  on  the  same  plane, 
they  are  seen  together  with  the  same  focus.  Hence  we  must 
supply  the  second  degree  of  indistinctness  by  slurring  with  the 
brush,  or  we  shall  have  a  severe  and  painful  intersection  of 
near  and  distant  lines,  impossible  in  nature.  Finally,  a  very 
false  principle  is  implied  by  part  of  what  is  advanced  by  your 
critic — which  has  led  to  infinite  error  in  art,  and  should  there- 
fore be  instantly  combated  whenever  it  were  hinted — that  the 


1843.]  "  MODERN  painters";  a  reply.  7 

ideal  is  different  from  the  true.  It  is,  on  the  contrary,  only 
the  perfection  of  truth.  The  Apollo  is  not  a  false  representa- 
tion of  man,  but  the  most  perfect  representation  of  all  that  is 
constant  and  essential  in  man — free  from  the  accidents  and  evils 
which  corrupt  the  truth  of  his  nature."^  Supposing  we  are 
describing  to  a  naturalist  some  animal  he  does  not  know,  and 
we  tell  him  we  saw  one  with  a  hump  on  its  back,  and  another 
with  strange  bends  in  its  legs,  and  another  with  a  long  tail, 
and  another  with  no  tail,  he  will  ask  us  directly.  But  what  is 
its  true  form,  what  is  its  real  form  ?  This  truth,  this  reality, 
which  he  requires  of  us,  is  the  ideal  form,  that  which  is 
hinted  at  by  all  the  individuals — aimed  at,  but  not  arrived  at. 
But  never  let  it  be  said  that,  when  a  painter  is  defying  the 
principles  of  nature  at  every  roll  of  his  brush,  as  I  have 
shown  that  Gaspar  does,  when,  instead  of  working  out  the 
essential  characters  of  specific  form,  and  raising  those  to  their 
highest  degree  of  nobility  and  beauty,  he  is  casting  all  charac- 
ter aside,  and  carrying  out  imperfection  and  accident ;  never 
let  it  be  said,  in  excuse  for  such  degradation  of  nature,  that  it 
is  done  in  pursuit  of  the  ideal.  As  well  might  this  be  said  in 
defence  of  the  promising  sketch  of  the  human  form  pasted 
on  the  wainscot  behind  the  hope  of  the  family — artist  and 
musician  of  equal  power — in  the  "  Blind  Fiddler.-'  f  Ideal 
beauty  is  the  generalization  of  consummate  knowledge,  the 
concentration  of  perfect  truth — not  the  abortive  vision  of 
ignorance  in  its  study.  Nor  was  there  ever  yet  one  conception 
of  the  human  mind  beautiful,  but  as  it  was  based  on  truth.  When- 

*  The  passage  in  the  Chronicle  ran  thus:  "  The  Apollo  is  but  an  ideal 
of  the  human  form;  no  figure  ever  moulded  of  flesh  and  blood  was  like  it." 
With  the  objection  to  this  criticism  we  may  compare  "Modern  Painters" 
fvol.  i.  p.  27),  where  the  ideal  is  defined  as  "the  utmost  degree  of  beauty  of 
which  the  species  is  capable."  See  also  vol.  ii.  p.  99:  "The  perfect  idea 
of  the  form  and  condition  in  which  all  the  properties  of  the  species  are  fully 
developed  is  called  the  Ideal  of  the  species;"  and  "That  unfortunate  dis 
tinctness  between  Idealism  and  Realism  which  leads  most  people  to  imagine 
that  the  Ideal  is  opposed  to  the  Real,  and  therefore  false." 

I  This  picture  of  Sir  David  Wilkie's  was  presented  to  the  National  Gallery 
(No.  99)  by  Sir  George  Beaumont,  in  1826. 


It 

8  LETTERS   ON"   ART.  [1843. 

ever  we  leave  nature,  we  fall  immeasurably  beneath  her.  So, 
again,  I  find  fault  with  the  "  ropy  wreath"  of  Gaspar,*  not 
because  he  chose  massy  cloud  instead  of  light  cloud;  but 
because  he  has  drawn  his  massy  cloud  falsely^  making  it  look 
tough  and  powerless,  like  a  chain  of  Bologna  sausages,  instead 
of  gifting  it  with  the  frangible  and  elastic  vastness  of  nature's 
mountain  vapor. 

Finally,  Sir,  why  must  it  be  only  "  when  he  is  gone  from 
us"  t  that  the  power  of  our  greatest  English  landscape  painter 
is  to  be  acknowledged  \  It  cannot,  indeed,  be  fully  understood 
until  the  current  of  years  has  swept  away  the  minor  hghts 
which  stand  around  it,  and  left  it  burning  alone ;  but  at  least 
the  scoff  and  the  sneer  might  be  lashed  into  silence,  if  those 
only  did  their  duty  by  whom  it  is  already  perceived.  And  let 
us  not  think  that  our  unworthiness  has  no  effect  on  the  work 
of  the  master.  I  could  be  patient  if  I  thought  that  no  effect 
was  wrought  on  his  noble  mind  by  the  cry  of  the  populace ; 
but,  scorn  it  as  he  may^  and  does,  it  is  yet  impossible  for  any 
human  mind  to  hold  on  its  course,  with  the  same  energy  and 
life,  through  the  oppression  of  a  perpetual  hissing,  as  when  it 
is  cheered  on  by  the  quick  sympathy  of  its  fellow-men.  It  is 
not  in  art  as  in  matters  of  political  duty,  where  the  path  is  clear 
and  the  end  visible.  The  springs  of  feeling  may  be  oppressed 
or  sealed  by  the  want  of  an  answer  in  other  bosoms,  though 
the  sense  of  principle  cannot  be  blunted  except  by  the  indi- 
vidual's oxDYi  error  ;  and  though  the  knowledge  of  what  is  right, 
and  the  love  of  what  is  beautiful,  may  still  support  our  great 
painter  through  the  languor  of  age— and  Heaven  grant  it  may 
for  years  to  come— yet  we  cannot  hope  that  he  will  ever  cast 
liis  spirit  upon  the  canvas  with  the  same  freedom  and  fire  as  if 

*Tlie  bank  of  cloud  in  the  "  Sacrifice  of  Isaac"  is  spoken  of  in  "Modern 
Painters"  (vol.  i.  p.  227,  Pt.  II,.  giii.,  cap.  3,  §7),  as  "a ropy,  tough-looking 
wreath."    On  this  the  reviewer  commented. 

t  "We  agree,"  wrote  the  Chronicle,  "with  the  writer  in  almost  every 
word  lie  says  about  this  great  artist;  and  we  have  no  doubt  that,  when  he  is 
gone  from  among  us,  his  memory  will  receive  the  honor  due  to  his  living 
genius."  See  also  the  postscript  to  the  first  volume  of  "Modern  Painters" 
(pp.  422-3),  written  in  June.  1851. 


\ 


1843.]  "MODERN"   PAINTERS*';   A    REPLY.  9 

he  felt  that  the  voice  of  its  inspiration  was  waited  for  among 
men,  and  dwelt  npon  with  devotion.  Once,  in  ruder  times, 
tlie  work  of  a  great  painter  *  was  waited  for  tlirougli  days  at 
his  door,  and  attended  to  its  place  of  deposition  by  the  enthu- 
siasm of  a  hundred  cities ;  and  painting  rose  from  that  time, 
a  rainbow  upon  the  Seven  Ilijls,  and  on  the  eypressed  heights 
of  Fiesole,  guiding  them  and  lighting  them  forever,  even  in 
the  stillness  of  their  decay.  How  can  we  liope  tliat  Enghmd 
will  ever  win  for  herself  such  a  crown,  while  the  works  of  her 
highest  intellects  are  set  for  the  pointing  of  the  finger  and  the 
sarcasm  of  the  tongue,  and  the  sole  reward  for  the  deep, 
earnest,  holy  labor  of  a  devoted  life,  is  the  weight  of  stone 
upon  the  trampled  grave,  where  the  vain  and  idle  crowd  will 
come  to  wonder  how  the  brushes  are  mimicked  in  the  marble 
above  the  dust  of  him  who  wielded  them  in  vain  ? 
I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir, 

Your  most  obedient  servant. 
The  Author  of  ''Modern  Painters." 

*  Cimabue.  The  quarter  of  the  town  is  yet  named,  from  the  rejoicing 
of  that  day,  Borgo  Allegri.*    {Original  Twte  to  tJie  letter:  see  editor's  preface.) 

*  The  picture  thus  honored  was  that  of  the  Virgin,  painted  for  the  Church  of  Santa 
Maria  Novella,  where  it  now  hangs  in  the  Rucellai  Chapel.  "This  work  was  an  object 
of  so  much  admiration  to  the  people,  .  .  .  that  it  was  carried  in  solemn  procession, 
with  the  sound  of  triunpets  and  other  festal  demonstrations,  from  the  house  of  Cima- 
bue to  the  church,  he  himself  being  highlj'  rewarded  and  honored  for  it.  It  is 
further  reported,  and  may  be  read  in  certain  records  of  old  painters,  that  whilst  Cima- 
bue was  painting  this  picture  in  a  garden  near  the  gate  of  San  Pietro,  King  Charles  tlic 
Elder,  of  Anjou,  passed  through  Florence,  and  the  authorities  of  the  city,  among othtr 
marks  of  respect,  conducted  him  to  see  the  picture  of  Cimabue.  When  this  work  was 
shown  to  the  king,  it  had  not  before  been  seen  by  any  one;  wherefore  all  the  men  ami 
women  of  Florence  hastened  in  great  crowds  to  admire  it,  making  all  possible  demon- 
strations of  delight.  The  inhabitants  of  the  neighborhood,  rejoicing  in  this  occurrence, 
ever  afterwards  called  that  place  Borgo  Allegri ;  and  this  name  it  has  since  retaine<l. 
although  in  process  of  time  it  became  enclosed  within  the  walls  of  the  city.— Vasari. 
"Lives  of  Painters."  Bohn's  edition.  London.  IS-jO.  Vol.  i.  p.  41.  Tliis  well-known 
anecdote  may  also  be  found  in  Jameson's  "  Early  Italian  Painters," p.  12. 


10  LETTERS   OK  ART.  [1843 


[From  the  "  Artist  and  Amateur's  Magazine"  (edited  by  E.  V.  Rippingille),  January, 

1843,  pp.  280-287.1 


ART  CRITICISM. 

To  the  Editor  of  the  "Artist  and  Amateufs  Magazine.'' 

Sir — Anticipating,  with  nmcli  interest,  your  reply  to  the 
candid  and  earnest  inquiries  of  your  unknown  correspondent, 
Matilda  Y.,"^  I  am  led  to  hope  that  you  will  allow  nie  to  have 
some  share  with  you  in  the  pleasant  task  of  confirming  an 
honest  mind  in  the  truth.  Subject  always  to  your  animadver- 
sion and  correction,  so  far  as  I  may  seem  to  you  to  be  led 
astray  by  my  peculiar  love  for  the  w^orks  of  the  artist  to  whom 
her  letter  refers,  I  yet  trust  that  in  most  of  the  remarks  I  have 
to  make  on  the  points  which  have  perplexed  her,  I  shall  be 
expressing  not  only  your  own  opinions,  but  those  of  every 
other  accomplished  artist  who  is  really  acquainted — and  wdiich 
of  our  English  masters  is  not? — with  the  noble  system  of 
poetry  and  philosophy  which  has  been  put  forth  on  canvas, 
during  the  last  forty  years,  by  the  great  painter  who  has  pre- 
sented us  with  the  almost  unparalleled  example  of  a  man 
winning  for  himself  the  unanimous  plaudits  of  his  generation 
and  time,  and  then  casting  them  away  like  dust,  that  he  may 
build  his  monument — ?ere  perennius. 

Your  correspondent  herself,  in  saying  that  mere  knowledge 

*  This  letter  was  written  in  reply  to  one  signed  "  Matilda  Y.,"  which 
had  been  printed  in  the  Artist  and  Amateur's  Magazine,  p.  265,  December, 
1843,  and  which  related  to  the  opposite  opinions  held  by  different  critics 
of  the  works  of  Turner,  which  were  praised  by  some  as  "beautiful  and 
profoundly  truthful  representations  of  nature,"  whilst  others  declared  them 
to  be  "executed  without  end,  aim,  or  principle."  "May  not  these  con- 
tradictions," wrote  the  correspondent,  in  the  passage  alluded  to  by  Mr. 
Ru.skin,  "  be  in  a  great  measure  the  result  of  extreme  ignorance  of  art  in  the 
great  mass  of  those  persons  who  take  upon  themselves  the  office  of  critics 
and  reviewers?  Can  any  one  be  a  judge  of  art  whose  judgment  is  not 
founded  on  an  accurate  knowledge  of  nature?  It  is  scarcely  possible  that 
a  mere  knowledge  of  pictures,  however  extensive,  can  qualify  a  man  for 
he  arduous  and  responsible  (iiities  of  public  criticism  of  art." 


1848.]  ART   CRITICISM.  11 

id  pictures  cannot  qualify  a  man  for  the  office  of  a  critic,  has 
touched  the  first  source  of  the  schisms  of  the  present,  and  of  all 
time,  in  questions  of  pictorial  merit.  AV^e  are  overwhelmed 
with  a  tribe  of  critics  who  are  fully  imbued  with  every  kind  of 
knowledge  which  is  useful  to  the  picture-dealer,  but  with  none 
that  is  important  to  the  artist.  They  know  where  a  picture 
has  been  retouched,  but  not  where  it  ought  to  have  been  ;  they 
know  if  it  has  been  injured,  but  not  if  the  injury  is  to  be 
regretted.  They  are  unquestionable  authorities  in  all  matters 
relating  to  the  panel  or  the  canvas,  to  the  varnish  or  the 
vehicle,  while  they  remain  in  entire  ignorance  of  that  which 
the  vehicle  conveys.  They  are  w^ell  acquainted  with  the 
technical  qualities  of  every  master's  touch  ;  and  when  their  dis- 
crimination fails,  plume  themselves  on  indisputable  tradition, 
and  point  triumphantly  to  the  documents  of  pictorial  geneal- 
ogy. But  they  never  go  quite  far  enough  back  ;  they  stop  one 
step  short  of  the  real  original ;  they  reach  the  human  one,  but 
never  the  Divine.  Whatever,  under  the  present  system  of 
study,  the  connoisseur  of  the  gallery  may  learn  or  know,  there 
is  one  thing  he  does  not  know — and  that  is  nature.  It  is  a 
pitiable  thing  to  hear  a  man  like  Dr.  Waagen,*  about  to  set 

*  Gustav  Friedrich  Waagen,  Director  of  the  Berlin  Gallery  from  1832 
until  his  death  in  1868.  He  was  the  author  of  various  works  on  art, 
amongst  them  one  entitled  "Works  of  Art  and  Artists  in  England"  (Lon- 
don, 1838),  which  is  that  alluded  to  here.  The  passage  quoted  concludes  a 
description  of  his  "first  attempt  to  navigate  the  watery  paths,"  in  a  voyage 
from  Hamburg  to  the  London  Docks  (vol.  i.  p.  13).  His  criticism  of  Turner 
may  be  found  in  the  same  work  (vol.  ii.  p.  80),  where  commenting  on  Tur- 
ner's "Fishermen  endeavoring  to  put  their  filsh  onboard,"  then,  as  now,  in 
the  gallery  of  Bridgewater  House  (No.  169),  and  which  was  painted  as  a 
rival  to  the  great  sea-storm  of  Vandevelde,  he  writes,  that  "in  the  truth 
of  clouds  and  waves"  ...  it  is  inferior  to  that  picture,  compared  with 
which  "it  appears  like  a  successful  piece  of  scene-painting.  The  great 
crowd  of  amateurs,  who  ask  nothing  more  of  the  art,  will  always  far  prefer 
Turner's  picture."  Dr.  Waagen  revised  and  re-edited  his  book  in  a  second, 
entitled,  "Treasures  of  Art  in  Great  Britain"  (1854),  in  whicli  these  pas- 
sages are  repeated  with  slight  verbal  alterations  (vol.  i.  p.  3,  vol.  ii.  p.  53). 
In  this  work  he  acknowledges  his  ignorance  of  Turner  at  the  time  the  first 
was  written,  and  gives  a  high  estimate  of  his  genius.  "  Buildings,"  he 
writes,  "  he  treats  with  peculiar  felicity,  while  the  sea  in  its  most  varied 


^^  LETTERS   OX    ART.  [I843 

the  seal  of  his  approbation,  or  the  brand  of  his  reprobation, 
on  all  the  pictures  in  our  island,  expressing  his  insipid  aston- 
ishment on  his  first  acquaintance  with  the  sea.     "  For  the  Ji/'sf 
time  I  understood  the  truth  of  their  pictures  (Backhuysen's  and 
Van  de  Yelde's),  and  the  refined  art  with  which,  bj  interven- 
ing  dashes  of  sunshine,  near  or  at  a  distance,   and  ships  to 
ani7nate  the  sce?ie,  they  produce  such  a  charming  variety  on  the 
surface  of  the  sea."     For  the  first  time  !— and  jet  this  gallerj- 
bred  judge,  this  discriminator  of  colored   shreds  and   canvas 
patches,  who  has  no  idea  how  ships  animate  the  sea,  until— 
charged  with  the  fates  of  the  Pvoyal  Academy— he  ventures 
his  invaluable  person  from  Kotterdam  to  Greenwich,  will  walk 
up  to  the  work  of  a  man  whose  brow  is  hard  with  the  spray  of 
a  hundred  storms,  and  characterize  it  as  "  wanting  in  truth  of 
clouds  and  waves"!      Alas  for  Art,   while   such   judges   sit 
enthroned  on  their  apathy  to  the  beautiful,  and  their  ignorance 
of  the  true,  and  with  a  canopy  of  canvas  between  them  and 
the  sky,  and  a  wall  of  tradition,  which  may  not  be  broken 
through,  concealing  from  them  the  horizon,  hurl  their  dark- 
ened verdicts  against  the  works  of  men,  whose  night  and  noon 
have  been  wet  with  the  dew  of  heaven— dwelling  on  the  deep 
sea,  or  wandering  among  the  solitary  places  of  the  earth,  until 
they  have  "made  the  mountains,  waves,  and  skies  a  part  of 
them  and  of  their  souls." 

When  information  so  narrow  is  yet  the  whole  stock  in  trade 
of  the  highest  autliorities  of  the  day,  what  are  we  to  expect 
fj-om  the  lowest  ?  Dr.  Waagen  is  a  most  favorable  specimen  of 
the  tribe  of  critics ;  a  man,  we  may  suppose,  impartial,  above 
all  national  or  party  prejudice,  and  intimately  acquainted  with 
that  half  of  his  subject  (the  technical  half)  which  is  all  we  can 
reasonably  expect  to  be  known  by  one  who  hag  been  trained  in 

aspects  is  eq^mlly  subservient  to  his  magic  brush"  !  !  He  adds,  that  but  for 
one  deficiency,  the  want  of  a  sound  technical  basis,  he  "should  not  hesi- 
tate to  recognize  Turner  as  the  greatest  landscape  painter  of  all  time"! 
>V  ith  regard,  however,  to  the  above-named  picture,  it  may  be  remember^^d 
that  MnRuskin  has  himself  instanced  it  as  one  of  the  marine  pictures 
which  Turner  spoiled  by  imitation  of  Yandevelde  ("Pre-Raphaelitism," 
p.  45). 


1843.]  ART   CRITICISM.  13 

the  painting-room  instead  of  in  tlie  iields.  No  authority  is 
more  incontrovertible  in  all  questions  of  the  genuineness  of  old 
pictures.  He  has  at  least  the  merit — not  common  among  those 
wlio  talk  most  of  the  old  masters^of  knowing  what  he  does 
admire,  and  will  not  fall  into  the  same  raptures  before  an  exe- 
crable copy  as  before  the  original.  If,  then,  we  find  a  man  of 
this  real  judgment  in  those  matters  to  whicli  his  attention  has 
been  directed,  entirely  incapable,  owing  to  his  ignorance  of 
nature,  of  estimating  a  modern  picture,  what  can  we  hope  from 
those  lower  critics  who  are  unacquainted  even  with  those 
technical  characters  which  they  have  opportunities  of  learning  i 
What,  for  instance,  are  we  to  anticipate  from  the  sapient  lucu- 
brations of  the  critic — for  some  years  back  the  disgrace  of  the 
pages  of  "  Blackwood  " — who  in  one  breath  displays  his  knowl- 
edge of  nature,  by  styling  a  painting  of  a  furze  bush  in  the 
bed  of  a  mountain  torrent  a  specimen  of  the  "  high  pastoral," 
and  in  the  next  his  knowledge  of  Art,  by  informing  us  that 
Mr.  Lee  ''  reminds  him  of  Gainsborough's  best  manner,  but  is 
inferior  to  him  in  composition  "!  *  We  do  not  mean  to  say 
anything  against  Mr.  Lee ;  but  can  we  forbear  to  smile  at  the 
hopeless  innocence  of  the  man's  novitiate,  who  could  be  reminded 
by  them  of  landscapes  powerful  enough  in  color  to  take  their 
place  beside  those  of  Rembrandt  or  Rubens  ?  A  little  attention 
will  soon  convince  your  correspondent  of  the  utter  futility  or 
falsehood  of  the  ordinary  critiques  of  the  press ;  and  there 
could,  I  believe,  even  at  present,  be  little  doubt  in  her  mind  as 
to  the  fitting  answer  to  the  question,  whether  we  are  to  take 
the  opinion  of  the  accomplished  artist  or  of  the  common  news- 
monger, were  it  not  for  a  misgiving  which,  be  she  conscious  of 
it  or  not,  is  probably  floating  in  her  mind — whether  that  can 
really  be  great  Art  which  has  no  influence  whatsoever  on  the 
multitude,  and  is  appreciable  only  by  the  initiated  few.  And 
this  is  the  real  question  of  diflftculty.  It  is  easy  to  prove  that 
such  and  such  a  critic  is  wrong  ;  but  not  so,  to  prove  that  what 
everybody  dislikes  is  right.     It  is  fitting  to  pay  respect  to  Sir 

*See  the  Preface  to  the  second  edition  of  "Modern  Painters" (vol.  i.  p. 
xix.,  etc.)    Frederick  Richard  Lee,  R.A.,  died  in  June.  1879. 


14  LETTEK3   ON   AKT.  [1843. 

Augustus  Callcott,  but  is  it  so  to  take  his  word  against  all  the 
world  ? 

This  inquiry  requires  to  be  followed  with  peculiar  caution  ; 
for  by  setting  at  defiance  the  judgment  of  the  public,  we  in 
some  sort  may  appear  to  justify  that  host  of  petty  scribblers, 
and  contemptible  painters,  who  in  all  time  have  used  the  same 
plea  in  defence  of  their  rejected  works,  and  have  received  in 
consequence  merciless  chastisement  from  contemporary  and 
powerful  authors  or  painters,  whose  reputation  was  as  universal 
as  it  was  just.  "  Mes  ouvrages,"  said  Eubens  to  his  challenger, 
Abraham  Janssens,  "out  ete  exposes  en  Italic,  et  en  Espagne, 
sans  que  j'aie  regu  la  nouvelle  de  leur  condamnation.  Yous 
n'avez  qu'a  soumettre  les  votres  a  la  meme  epreuve."  *  "  Je 
detie,"  says  Boileau,  "  tons  les  amateurs  les  plus  mecontents  du 
public,  de  me  citer  un  bon  livre  que  le  public  ait  jamais  rebute, 
a  moins  qu'ils  ne  mettent  en  ce  rang  leur  ecrits,  de  la  bonte 
desquels  eux  seuls  sont  persuades." 

Now  the  fact  is,  that  the  whole  difficulty  of  the  question  is 
caused  by  the  ambiguity  of  this  word — the  "  public."  Whom 
does  it  include?  People  continually  forget  that  there  is  a 
separate  public  for  every  picture,  and  for  every  book.  Appealed 
to  with  reference  to  any  particular  work,  the  public  is  that 
class  of  persons  who  possess  the  knowledge  which  it  presup- 
])Oses,  and  the  faculties  to  which  it  is  addressed.  With 
reference  to  a  new  edition  of  Newton's  Principia,  the  "  public" 
means  little  more  than  the  Royal  Society.  With  reference  to 
one  of  Wordsworth's  poems,  it  means  all  who  have  hearts. 
With  reference  to  one  of  Moore's,  all  who  have  passions. 
AVith  reference  to  the  works  of  Hogarth,  it  means  those  who 
have  worldly  knowledge — to  the  works  of  Giotto,  those  who 
luive  religious  faith.     Each  work  must  be  tested  exclusively  by 

*  AbralKun  Janssens,  in  his  jealousy  of  Rubens,  proposed  to  him  that 
they  should  each  paint  a  picture,  and  submit  the  rival  works  to  the  decision 
()/  the  public.  ^Ir.  Iluskin  gives  Rubens'  reply,  the  tenor  of  which  may  be 
found  in  any  life  of  the  artist.  Sec  Hasselt's  "  Histoire  de  Rubens"  (Brus- 
sels, 1840),  p.  48,  from  which  Mr.  Ruskin  quotes;  Descamps,  vol.  i.  p.  304; 
Walpole's  "Anecdotes  of  Painting,"  Bohn's  octavo  edition,  p.  306. 


1843.]  ART  CRITICISM.  15 

the  iiat  of  the  partieitlar  public  to  wliuin  it  is  addressed. 
We  will  listen  to  no  comments  on  Newton  from  people  who 
have  no  mathematical  knowledge ;  to  none  on  Wordsworth 
from  tliose  who  have  no  hearts ;  to  none  on  Giotto  from  tliose 
who  have  no  religion.  Therefore,  when  we  have  to  form 
a  judgment  of  any  new  work,  the  question  ''  What  do  the 
public  say  to  it  ?"  is  indeed  of  vital  importance  ;  but  we  must 
always  inquire,  first,  who  are  its  public  i  We  must  not  sub- 
mit a  treatise  on  moral  philosophy  to  a  conclave  of  horse- 
jockeys,  nor  a  work  of  deej)  artistical  research  to  the  writers 
for  the  Art  Union. 

The  public,  then,  vre  repeat,  when  referred  to  with  respect 
to  a  particular  work,  consist  only  of  those  who  have  knowledge 
of  its  subject,  and  are  possessed  of  the  faculties  to  which  it  is 
addressed. 

If  it  fail  of  touching  thi'se^  the  work  is  a  bad  one ;  but  it  in 
no  degree  militates  against  it  that  it  is  rejected  by  those  to 
whom  it  does  not  appeal.  To  whom,  then,  let  us  ask,  and 
to  what  public  do  the  works  of  Turner  appeal  i  To  those  only 
we  reply,  who  have  profound  and  disciplined  acquaintance 
with  nature,  ardent  poetical  feeling,  and  keen  eye  for  color 
(a  faculty  far  more  rare  than  an  ear  for  music).  They  are 
deeply-toned  poems,  intended  for  all  who  love  poetry,  but  not 
for  those  who  deli^i^ht  in  mimickries  of  wine-fi^lasses  and 
nutshells.  They  are  deep  treatises  on  natural  phenomena, 
intended  for  all  who  are  acquainted  with  such  phenomena,  but 
not  for  tliose  who,  like  the  painter  Barry,  are  amazed  at  find- 
ing  the  realities  of  the  Alps  grander  than  the  imaginations  of 
Salvator,  and  assert  that  they  saw  the  moon  from  the  Mont 
C'enis  four  times  as  big  as  usual,  "  from  being  so  much  nearer 
to  it"  !  *     And  they  are  studied  melodies  of  exquisite  color, 

*  This  is  a  singular  instance  of  the  profound  ignorance  of  huidscapc 
in  which  great  and  intellectual  painters  of  tlie  human  form  may  remain; 
an  ignorance,  which  commonly  renders  their  remarks  on  landscape  paint 
ing  nugatory,  if  not  false. f 

+  The  amazement  of  the  painter  is  underrated:  "  You  will  believe  me  much  nearet 
heaven  upon  Mount  Cenis  than  I  was  before,  or  shall  proba»)ly  beapain  for  some  time. 
We  passed  this  mountain  on  Sunday  last,  and  about  seven  in  the  moniing  were  near 


16  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [184S. 

intended  for  those  who  liave  perception  of  color;  not  for 
those  wlio  fancy  that  all  trees  are  Prussian  green.  Then  comes 
the  question,  Were  the  works  of  Turner  ever  rejected  by  any 
person  possessing  even  partially  these  qualifications?  We 
answer  boldly,  never.  On  the  contrary,  they  are  universally 
hailed  by  tlds  public  with  an  enthusiasm  not  undeserving 
in  ap})earance — at  least  to  those  who  are  debarred  from  sharing 
in  it,  of  its  usual  soubriquet — the  Turner  mania. 

Is,  then,  the  number  of  those  who  are  acquainted  with  the 
truth  of  nature  so  limited  ?  So  it  has  been  asserted  by  one  who 
knew  nnich  both  of  Art  and  Nature,  and  both  were  glorious 
in  his  country."'^ 

''7/7.     Ov   i-iEvroi    fia^Oadiv    avBpGOTtoi    ovoi^id^eiv    ovtooZ. 
^Dj.     Uorepov,    co    '  Ircma,    oi   lidorei   rj   oi  /irj    eidoTEi; 

in.  (  Oi   TioXXoi. 
2n.     El6i   5'    ovToi   oi   aidores    rdXr^Bei,    oi   noXXoi; 
in.    Ov   d?}ra.^^ 

HiPPiAs  Major. 

Now,  we  are  not  inclined  to  go  quite  so  far  as  this.  There 
are  many  subjects  with  respect  to  which  the  multitude  are 
cognizant  of  truth,  or  at  least  of  so?ne  truth ;  and  those  sub- 
jects may  be  generally  characterized  as  everything  which 
materially  concerns  themselves  or  their  interests.  The  public 
are  acquainted  with  the  nature  of  their  own  passions,  and  the 
point  of  their  own  calamities — can  laugh  at  the  weakness  they 

*  Plato. — "  Ilippias.     Men  do  not  commonly  say  so. 

Socrates.     Who  do  not  say  so — those  who  know,  or  those 

who  do  not  know  ? 
Hippias.     The  multitude. 

Socrates.     Are  then  the  multitude  acquainted  with  truth? 
IJippias.     Certainly  not.'" 
The  answer  is  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  sophist;  but  put  as  an  estab- 
lished fact,  which  he  cannot  possibly  deny.f 

the  top  of  the  road  over  it,  on  both  sides  of  which  the  mountain  rises  to  a  very  great 
height,  yet  so  high  were  we  in  the  valley  between  them  that  the  moon,  which  was 
above  tlie  liorizon  of  the  mountains,  appeared  at  least  five  times  as  big  as  usual,  and 
much  more  distinctly  marked  than  I  ever  saw  it  through  some  ver)'  good  telescopes."— 
Letter  to  Edmnnd  Burke,  dated  Turin,  Sept.  24,  1766.  Works  of  James  Barrj',  R.A., 
2  vols.,  quarto  (London.  IROO),  vol  i.  p.  r)8.  He  died  in  1806. 
t  Plato :  Hippias  Major,  28?^  E.  Steph. 


1843.]  ART  CRITICISM.  1')' 

feel,  and  weep  at  the  miseries  they  liave  experienced ;  but  all 
the  sagacity  they  possess,  be  it  how  great  soever,  will  nut 
enable  them  to  judge  of  likeness  to  that  which  they  have  never 
seen,  nor  to  acknowledge  principles  on  which  they  have  never 
reflected.  Of  a  comedy  or  a  drama,  an  epigram  or  a  ballad, 
they  are  judges  from  whom  there  is  no  appeal ;  but  not  of  the 
representation  of  facts  which  they  have  never  examined,  of 
beauties  which  they  have  never  loved.  It  is  not  suflicient 
that  the  facts  or  the  features  of  nature  be  around  us,  while 
they  are  not  within  us.  We  may  walk  day  by  day  through 
grove  and  meadow,  and  scarcely  know  more  concerning  them 
than  is  known  by  bird  and  beast,  that  the  one  has  shade  for 
the  head,  and  the  other  softness  for  the  foot.  It  is  not  true 
that  "the  eye,  it  cannot  choose  but  see,"  unless  we  obey  the 
following  condition,  and  go  forth  "in  a  wise  passiveness,"* 
free  from  that  plague  of  our  own  hearts  which  brings  the 
shadow  of  ourselves,  and  the  tumult  of  our  petty  interests  and 
impatient  passions,  across  the  light  and  calm  of  Xature.  We 
do  not  sit  at  the  feet  of  our  mistress  to  listen  to  her  teaching  ; 
but  we  seek  her  only  to  drag  from  her  that  which  may  suit  our 
purpose,  to  see  in  her  the  confirmation  of  a  theory,  or  find  in 
her  fuel  for  our  pride.  Nay,  do  we  often  go  to  her  even  thus  ? 
Have  we  not  rather  cause  to  take  to  ourselves  the  full  weight 
of  Wordswoi-th's  noble  appeal — 

"  VaiQ  pleasures  of  luxurious  life! 
Forever  with  yourselves  at  strife, 
Through  town  and  country,  both  deranged 
By  affections  interchanged, 
And  all  the  perishable  gauds 
That  heaven-deserted  man  applauds. 
When  will  your  hapless  patrons  learn 
To  watch  and  ponder,  to  discern 
The  freshness,  the  eternal  youth 
Of  admiration,  sprung  from  truth, 
From  beauty  infinitely  growing 
Upon  a  mind  with  love  o'erflowing: 

*  "Wordsworth.   "Poems  of  Sentiment  and  Reflection, "  i.  "Expostulation 
and  Reply." 


18 


LETTERS   01^   ART. 


[1843. 


To  sound  the  depths  of  every  art 

That  seeks  its  wisdom  through  the  heart?"  * 


When  will  they  learn  it?     Hardly,  we  fear,  in  this  age  of 

steam  and  iron,  luxury  and  seliishness.     We  grow  more  and 

more  artificial  day  by  day,  and  see  less  and  less  worthiness  in 

those  pleasures  which  bring  with  them  no  morbid  excitement, 

m  that  knowledge  which  affords  us  no  opportuuity  of  display.' 

Your  correspondent  may  rest  assured  that  those  who  do  not 

care  for  nature,  who  do  not  love  her,  cannot  see  her.      A  few 

of  her  phenomena  lie  on  the  surface;  the  nobler  number  lie 

deep,  and  are  the  reward  of  watching  and  of  thought.     The 

artist  may  choose  which  he  will  render:   no  human  art  can 

render  both.     If  he  paint  the  surface,  he  will  catch  the  crowd ; 

if  he  paint  the  depth,  he  will  be  admired  only— but  with  how 

deep  and  fervent  admiration,  none  but  they  who  feel  it  can 

tell— by  the  thoughtful  and  observant  few. 

There  are  some  admirable  observations  on  this  subject  in 
your  December  number  ("An  Evening's  Gossip  with  a 
Famter"  f) ;  but  there  is  one  circumstance  with  respect  to  the 
works  of  Turner  which  yet  further  limits  the  number  of  their 
admirers.  They  are  not  prosaic  statements  of  the  phenomena 
ot  nature-tliey  are  statements  of  them  under  the  influence  of 
ardent  feeling;  they  are,  in  a  word,  the  most  fervent  and  real 
poetry  which  the  English  nation  is  at  present  producing  Kow 
not  only  is  this  proverbially  an  age  in  which  poetry  is  little 
cared  for;  but  even  with  those  who  have  most  love  of  it  and 
most  need  of  it,  it  requires,  especially  if  high  and  philosophi- 
cal, an   attuned,  quiet,  and   exalted   frame   of  mind   for   its 

*  -Memorials  of  a  Tour  in  Scotland.     1814.     iii.  Effusion  " 

t  bee  the  Artist  and  Amateurs  Magazine,  p.  248.     The  article  named 

ponts  out  to  his  companion  "  Chatworthy,"  who  represents  the  genera 

untaintod  )  '  n''  '^  ^'^  '/'^^^  "^^^^^"^^^^  ^"  ^''  -'  "-  P-e,  n'aturd 
untainted,  highly  educated,  and  intelligent /...."  The  argument  is  con^ 
tmued  over  some  pages,  but  although  the  Magazine  is  not  now  readily 
accessible  to  the  ordinary  reader,  it  will  not  be  thought  necessary  to  go 
further  into  the  discussion.  J'    ^  S'J 


43.] 


ART   CRITICISM.  1^ 


lioyment;    and    if   dragged  into   the    midst   of   the   noisy 
terests  of  every-day  life,  may  easily  be  made  ridiculous  or 
iensive.     Wordsworth  recited,  by  Mr.  Wakley,  in  the  House 
I  Commons,  in  the  middle  of  a  tiuaucial  debate,  would  sound, 
,  all    probability,    very    like   Mr.    Wakley's>=-    own    verses. 
iTordsworth,  read  in  the  stillness  of  a  mountain  hollow,  has 
le  force  of  the  mountain  waters.     What  would  be  the  effect 
fa  passage  of  Milton  recited  in  the  middle  of  a  pantomime,  or 
f  a  dreainy  stanza  of  Shelley  upon  the  Stock  Exchange  ?     Are 
^e  to  judge  of  the  nightingale  by  hearing  it  sing  in  broad  day- 
aht  in  Cheapside  ?     For  just  such  a  judgment  do  we  form  of 
^urner  by  standing  before  his  pictures  in  the  Koyal  Academy, 
"t  is  a  strange  thing  that  the  public  never  seem  to  suspect  that 
here   mav   be   a   poetry   in   painting,   to   meet  which,  some 
jreparatiJn  of  sympathy,  some  harmony  of  circumstance,  is 
squired ;  and  that  it  is  just  as  impossible  to  see  half  a  dozen 
n-eat  pictures  as  to  read  half  a  dozen  great  poems  at  the  same 
ime  if  their  tendencies  or  their  tones  of  feeling  be  contrary  or 
liscordant.     Let  us  imagine  what  would  be  the  effect  on  the 
nind  of  any  man  of  feeling,  to  whom  an  eager  friend,  desirous 
B)f  impressing  upon  him  the  merit  of  different  poets,  should 
read  successively,  and  without  a  pause,  the  following  passages, 
in  which  lie  something  of  the   prevailing   character   of   the 
works  of  six  of  our  greatest  modern  artists : 

Landseer. 

"  His  hair,  his  size,  his  mouth,  his  lugs, 
Sliow'd  he  was  nane  o'  Scotland's  dougs, 
But  whalpit  some  place  far  abroad 
What  sailors  gang  to  fish  for  cod."  t 

*  Mr  Thomas  Wakley,  at  this  time  M.P.  for  Finsbury,  and  coroner 
for  AliddleV^     He  was  the  founder  of  the  Dtnce,.  and  took  a  deep  mteres 
^n    to'L,  which  he  at  one  time  practised.     I  do  not  ""d,  '.o-v.r^th^ 
he  published  any  volume  of  poems,  though  he  -y -•="  ""^  "f^^J'^ 
author,  as  the  letter  seems  to  imply,  of  some  occasional  verses.    He  died 

^^+'  The  references  to  this  and  the  five  passages  following  are  (1)  Rums 
..T,eT:vaDogs.,-  (2)  Milton,  .- Paradise  Lo.t,"vi  79.,  («>  B-ns,  ^^  Dc^ 
and  Doctor  Hornbook,"  (4)  Byron,  •' Hebrew  Melod.es,        Oh.  snatched 


..  t 


^0  LETTERS   ON  ART. 

Martin. 

"  Far  in  the  horizon  to  the  north  appear'd, 
From  skirt  to  sliirt,  a  fiery  region,  stretched 
In  battailous  aspect,  and  nearer  view 
Bristled  with  upright  beams  innumerable 
Of  rigid  spears,  and  helmets  throng'd,  and  shields 
Various,  with  boastful  argument  portray 'd." 

WiLKIE. 

"  The  risin'  moon  began  to  glowr 
The  distant  Cumnock  hills  out  owre  ; 
To  count  her  horns,  wi'  a'  my  pow'r, 

I  set  mysel' ; 
But  whether  she  had  three  or  fowr, 

I  couldua  tell." 

Eastlake. 

"  And  thou,  who  tell'st  me  to  forget, 
Thy  looks  are  wan,  thine  eyes  are  wet." 

Stanfield. 

"  Ye  mariners  of  England, 
Who  guard  our  native  seas. 
Whose  flag  has  braved  a  thousand  years 
The  battle  and  the  breeze." 

Turner. 

"  The  point  of  one  white  star  is  quivering  still, 
Deep  in  the  orange  light  of  widening  dawn. 
Beyond  the  purple  mountains.     Through  a  chasm 
Of  wind-divided  mist  the  darker  lake  j 

Reflects  it,  now  it  fades:  it  gleams  again,  t 

As  the  waves  fall,  and  as  the  burning  threads  j 

Of  woven  cloud  unravel  in  pale  air,  I 

'Tis  lost!  and  through  yon  peaks  of  cloudlike  snow  \ 

The  roseate  sunlight  quivers."  j 

Precisely  to  such  advantage  as  the  above  passages,  so  placed,*! 
appear,  are  tlie  works  of  any  painter  of  mind   seen  in  tlie 

away  in  beauty's  bloom;"  (5)  Campbell;  and  (6)  Shelley,    "Prometheus! 
Unbound,"  Act  ii.  sc.  1.  | 

*  It  will  be  felt  at  once  that  the  more  serious  and  higher  passages! 
generally  suffer  most.  But  Stanfield,  little  as  it  may  be  thought,  suffers' 
grievously  m  the  Academy,  just  as  the  fine  passage  from  Campbell  is; 
rumed  by  its  position  between  the  perfect  tenderness  of  Byron  and  Shelley.' 
The  more  vulgar  a  picture  is,  the  better  it  bears  the  Academy. 

if 


I 


Ijl  AKT   CRITICISM.  21 

Mdemy.     None  suffer  more  than  Turner's,  ^'liich  are   not 
oy  interfered  with  by  the  prosaic  pictures  around  them,  but 
n  itralize  each  other.     Two  works  of  his,  side  by  side,  destroy 
e;h  other  to  a  dead  certainty,  for  each  is  so  vast,  so  com- 
pte,  60  demandant  of  every  power,  so  sufficient  for  every 
,i  ire  of  the  mind,  that  it  is  utterly  impossible  for  two  to  be 
c  nprehended  together.     Each  must  have  the  undivided  in- 
tilect,  and  each  is  destroyed  by  the  attraction  of  the  other ; 
a  1  it  is  the  chief  power  and  might  of  these  pictures,  that 
•  V  are  works  for  the  closet  and  the  heart— works  to  be  dwelt 
u   separately  and   devotedly,  and   then  chietiy  when  the 
d  is  in  its  highest  tone,  and  desirous  of  a  beauty  which 
1  A-  be  food  for  its  immortality.     It  is  the  very  stamp  and 
t,ence  of  the  purest  poetry,  that  it  can  only  be  so  met  and 
vderstood;   and   that   the   clash  of   common   interests,   and 
t3  roar  of  the  selfish  world,  must  be  hushed  about  the  heart, 
[fore  it  can  hear  the  still,  small  voice,  wherein  rests  the  power 
(ramunicated  from  the  Holiest.* 

Can,  then,— will  be,  if  I  mistake  not,  the  final  inquiry  of 

'.ur  correspondent,— can,  then,  we  ordinary  mortals,— can  I, 

"^10  am  not  Sir  Augustus  Callcott,  nor  Sir  Francis  Chantrey, 

^L'r  derive  any  pleasure  from  works  of  this  lofty  character? 

,eaven  forbid,* we  reply,  that  it  should  be  otherwise.  Nothing 

lore  is  necessary  for  the  appreciation  of  them,  than  that  which 

necessary  for  the  appreciation   of   any  great   writer— the 

liet  study  of  him  with  an  humble  heart.     There  are,  indeed, 

'•hnical  qualities,  difficulties  overcome  and  principles  devel- 

-  "Although  it  is  in  verse  that  the  most  consummate  skill  in  com- 
-ition  is  to  be  looked  for,  and  all  the  artifices  of  language  displayed,  yet 
,is  in  verse  only  that  we  throw  off  the  yoke  of  the  world,  and  are,  as  it 
[ere,  privileged  to  utter  our  deepest  and  holiest  feelings.      Poetry  m  this 

'^'  [spect  mav  be  called  the  salt  of  the  earth.  We  express  in  it,  and  receive  in  it. 
intiments'for  which,  were  it  not  for  this  permitted  medium,  the  usages  of  the 

^  orld  would  neither  allow  utterance  nor  acceptance."— .^'o''^/i<7/«  Colloquies* 

1^^'    ich  allowance  is  never  made  to  the  painter.     In  him,  inspiration  is  called 

^"'  (sanity— in  him,  the  sacred  fire,  possession. 

*  "Sir  Thomas  More;  or.  Colloquies  on  the  Progress  and  Prospects  of  Sopiety." 
^Uoquy  xiv.  (vol.  ii.  p.  399,  in  Murray's  edition,  1829). 


22  LETTERS    OX    ART.  [184^- 

oped,  which  are  reserved  for  the  enjoyment  of  the  artist ;  bu 
these  do  not  add  to  tlie  influence  of  the  picture.  On  the  con 
trary,  we  nnist  break  through  its  charm,  before  we  can  com: 
prehend  its  means,  and  "murder  to  dissect."  The  picture  i 
intended,  not  for  artists  alone,  but  for  all  who  love  what  i 
portrays  ;  and  so  little  doubt  have  we  of  the  capacity  of  all  t( 
understand  the  w^orks  in  question,  that  we  have  the  most  con 
fident  expectation,  within  the  next  fifty  years,  of  seeing  thi 
name  of  Turner  jjlaced  on  the  same  impregnable  height  witl 
that  of  Shakespeare."  Both  have  committed  errors  of  taste 
and  judgment.  In  both  it  is,  or  will  be,  heresy  even  to  fee 
those  errors,  so  entirely  are  they  overbalanced  by  the  giganti( 
powers  of  whose  impetuosity  they  are  the  result.  So  soon  a; 
the  public  are  convinced,  by  the  maintained  testimony  of  higl 
authority,  that  Turner  is  wortli  understanding,  they  will  try  t( 
understand  him ;  and  if  they  try,  they  can.  Xor  are  they 
now,  as  is  commonly  thought,  despised  or  defied  by  him.  H( 
has  too  much  respect  for  them  to  endeavor  to  please  them  b} 
falsehood.  lie  will  not  win  for  himself  a  hearing  by  tlu 
betrayal  of  his  message. 

Finally,  then,  we  would  recommend  your  correspondent 
first,  to  divest  herself  of  every  atom  of  lingering  respect  oi 
regard  for  the  common  criticism  of  the  press,  and  to  hold*  fast 


*  "  This  Turner,  of  whom  you  have  known  so  little  while  he  was  living 
among  you,  will  one  day  take  his  place  beside  Shakespeare  and  Verulani, 
in  the  annals  of  the  light  of  England. 

"Yes:  beside  Shakspeare  and  Yerulam,  a  third  star  in  that  central  con 
stellation,  round  which,  in  the  astronomy  of  intellect,  all  other  stars  mak( 
their  circuit.  By  Shakespeare,  humanity  was  unsealed  to  you ;  by  Verulaili 
the  principles  oi  nature;  and  by  Turner,  her  aspect.  All  tiiese  w^ere  sent  to 
unlock  one  of  the  gates  of  light,  and  to  unlock  it  for  the  lirst  time.  But  of 
all  the  three,  though  not  the  greatest,  Turner  was  the  most  unprecedented 
in  his  work.  Bacon  did  what  Aristotle  had  attempted;  Shakespeare  did 
perfectly  what  uEschylus  did  partially;  but  none  before  Turner  had  lifted 
the  veil  from  the  face  of  nature;  the  majesty  of  the  hills  and  forests 
had  received  no  interpretation,  and  the  clouds  passed  unrecorded  from  the 
face  of  the  heavens  which  they  adorned,  and  of  the  earth  to  which  they 
ministered." — "  Lectures  on  Architecture  and  Painting,"  by  John  Ruskin: 
published  1854;  pp.  180,  181. 


1843.1  ART   CRITICISM.  23 

by  the  authority  of  Callcott,  Chantrey,  Landseer,  and  Stantield  ; 
and  this,  not  because  we  would  have  her  slaA)ishly  subject  to 
any  authority  but  that  of  her  own  eyes  and  reason,  but  because 
we  would  not  have  her  blown  about  with  every  wind  of 
doctrine,  before  she  has  convinced  her  reason  or  learned  to  use 
her  eyes.  And  if  she  can  draw  at  all,  let  her  make  careful 
studies  of  any  natural  objects  that  may  happen  to  come  in  her 
way, — sticks,  leaves,  or  stones, — and  of  distant  atmospheric 
effects  on  groups  of  objects;  not  for  the  sake  of  the  drawing 
itself,  but  for  the  sake  of  the  powers  of  attention  and  accurate 
observation  which  thus  only  can  be  cultivated.  And  let  her 
make  the  study,  not  thinking  of  this  artist  or  of  that ;  not 
conjecturing  what  Harding  would  have  done,  or  Stanfield,  or 
Callcott,  with  her  subject ;  not  trying  to  draw  in  a  bold  style, 
or  a  free  style,  or  any  other  style ;  but  drawing  all  she  sees^  as 
far  as  may  be  in  her  power,  earnestly,  faithfully,  unselectingly  ; 
and,  which  is  perhaps  the  more  difficult  task  of  the  two,  not 
drawing  what  she  does  not  see.  Oh,  if  people  did  but  know 
how  many  lines  nature  suggests  without  shmchig,  what  differ- 
ent art  should  we  have !  And  let  her  never  be  discouraged  by 
ill  success.  She  will  seldom  have  gained  more  knowledge  than 
when  slie  most  feels  her  failure.  Let  her  use  every  oppor- 
tunity of  examining  the  works  of  Turner ;  let  her  try  to  copy 
them,  then  try  to  copy  some  one  else's,  and  observe  which 
presents  most  of  that  kind  of  difficulty  which  she  found  in 
copying  nature.  Let  her,  if  possible,  extend  her  acquaintance 
with  wild  natural  scenery  of  every  kind  and  character,  endeav- 
oring in  each  species  of  scenery  to  distinguish  those  features 
which  are  expressive  and  harmonious  from  those  which  are 
unaffecting  or  incongruous ;  and  after  a  year  or  two  of  such 
discipline  as  this,  let  her  judge  for  herself.  No  authority  need 
then,  or  can  then,  be  very'  influential  with  her.  Her  own 
pleasure  in  works   of  true    greatness*  will  be  too  real,  too 

*  We  have  not  siiflBciently  expressed  our  concurrence  in  the  opinion  of 
her  friend,  that  Turner's  modern  works  are  his  greatest.  His  early  ones 
are  nothing  but  amplifications  of  what  others  have  done,  or  hard  studies 
of  every-day  truth.     His  later  works  no  one  but  himself  could  have  con- 


24  LETTEES   ON   ART.  [1857. 

instinctive,  to  be  persuaded  or  lauglied  out  of  her.  We  bid 
her,  therefore,  heartily  good-speed,  with  this  final  warning: 
Let  her  beware,  in  going  to  nature,  of  taking  with  her  the 
commonplace  dogmas  or  dicta  of  art.  Let  her  not  look  for 
what  is  like  Titian  or  like  Claude,  for  composed  form  or 
arranged  chiaroscuro ;  but  believe  that  everything  which  God 
has  made  is  beautiful,  and  that  everything  which  nature  teaches 
is  tnie.  Let  her  beware,  above  everything,  of  that  wicked 
pride  which  makes  man  think  he  can  dignify  God's  glorious 
creations,  or  exalt  the  majesty  of  his  universe.  Let  her  be 
humble,  we  repeat,  and  earnest.  Truth  was  never  sealed,  if  so 
sought.  And  once  more  we  bid  her  good-speed  in  the  words 
of  our  poet-moralist : 

"Enough  of  Science  and  of  Art: 
Seal  up  these  barren  leaves; 
Come  forth,  and  bring  with  you  a  heart 
That  -watches,  and  receives."* 

I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir, 


Your  obedient  humble  servant 


The  Author  of  "  Modekn  Painters." 


[From  "  Some  Account  of  the  Origin  and  Objects  of  the  New  Oxford  Examinations  for 
the  Title  of  Associate  in  Arts  and  Certificates,"  by  T.  D.  Acland,  late  Fellow  of  All 
Souls'  College,  Oxford,t  1858,  pp.  54-60.] 

THE  ARTS  AS  A  BRANCH  OF  EDUCATION. 

Penrith,  Sept.  25,  1857. 
My  dear  Sir  :  I  liave  just  received  your  most  interesting 
letter,  and  will  try  to  answer  as  shortly  as  I  can,  saying  nothing 
of  what  I  feel,  and  what  you  must  well  know  I  should  feel, 

ceived:  thej'  are  the  result  of  the  most  exalted  imagination,  acting  with  the 
knowledge  acquired  by  means  of  his  former  works. 

♦Wordsworth.  "Poems  of  Sentiment  and  Reflection."  ii.  "The 
Tables  Turned  "  (1798),  being  tlie  companion  poem  to  that  quoted  ante,  p. 
17.     Tlie  second  line  should  read,  "  Close  up  these  barren  leaves." 

\  This  work  related  to  University  co-operation  with  schemes  for  middle- 
class  education,  and  included  letters   from  various  authorities,   amongst 


1857. J  THE   ARTS   AS   A    BKAXCII    OF    EDUCATION.  25 

respecting  the  difficulty  of  the  questions  and  their  importance  ; 
except  only  this,  that  I  should  not  have  had  the  boldness  to 
answer  your  letter  by  return  of  post,  unless,  in  consequence  of 
conversations  on  this  subject  with  Mr.  Acland  and  Dr.  Acland, 
two  months  ago,  I  had  been  lately  thinking  of  it  more  than  of 
any  other.* 

Your  questions  fall  under  two  heads  :  (1)  The  range  which 
an  art  examination  can  take  ;  (2)  The  connection  in  which  it 
should  be  placed  witli  other  examinations. 

I  think  the  art  examination  should  have  three  objects : 

(1)  To  put  the  haj^piness  and  knowledge  which  the  study 
of  art  conveys  within  the  conception  of  the  youth,  so  that  he 
may  in  after-life  pursue  them,  if  he  has  the  gift. 

(2)  To  enforce,  as  far  as  possible,  such  knowledge  of  art 
among  those  who  are  likely  to  become  its  patrons,  or  the  guar- 
dians of  its  works,  as  may  enable  them  usefully  to  fuliil  those 
duties. 

(3)  To  distinguish  pre-eminent  gift  foi-  the  production  of 
works  of  art,  so  as  to  get  hold  of  all  the  good  artistical  faculty 

I   born  in  the  country,  and  leave  no  Giotto  lost  among  hill-shcp- 
j  herds,  t 

others  one  from  Mr.  Hullah  on  Music.     The  present  letter  was  addressed 

to  the  Rev.  F.  Temple  (now  Bishop  of  Exeter),  and  was  written  in  reply 

to  a  statement  of  certain  points  in  debate  between  him  and  Mr.  (now  Sir 

i    Thomas)  Acland.     In  forwarding  it  to  his  opponent,  Mr.  Temple  wrote  as 

I    follows.  "  The  liberal  arts  are  supreme  over  their  sciences.     Instead  of  the 

}    rules  being  despotic,  the  great  artist  usually  proves  his  greatness  by  rightly 

'    setting  aside  rules;  and  the  great  critic  is  he  who,  while  he  knows  the  rule, 

can  appreciate  the  '  law  within  the  law  '  which  overrides  the  rule.     In  no 

j    other  way  does  Ruskin  so  fully  show  his  greatness  in  criticism  as  in  that 

I    fine  inconsistency  for  which  he  has  been  so  often  attacked  by  men  who  do 

not  see  the  real  consistency  that  lies  beneath." 

*  In  the  following  year  Mr.  Ruskin  wrote  a  paper  for  the  National 

Association  for  the  Promotion  of  Social  Science,  on   "Education  in  Art" 

]    (Transactions,  1858,  pp.  811-316),  now  reprinted  in  the  eleventh  volume  of 

I    Mr.  Ruskin 's  works,  "  A  Joy  for  Ever,"  p.  185.    To  this  paper  the  reader 

of  the  present  letter  is  referred. 

f  "  Giotto  passed  tlie  first  ten  years  of  his  life,  a  shepherd-boy.  among 
these  hills  (of  Ficsole);  was  found  by  Cimabue,  near  his  native  vilhige, 
drawing  one  of  his  sheep  upon  a  smooth  stone;  was  yielded  up  by  his 


26  LETJEKS    OX    ART.  [1857. 

In  order  to  accomplisli  the  first  object,  I  think  that,  accord- 
ing to  Mr.  Acland's  proposal,  preliminary  knowledge  of  draw- 
ing and  innsic  slionld  Ije  asked  for,  in  connection  with  writing 
and  arithmetic  ;  l)ut  not,  in  the  preliminary  examination,  made 
to  count  towards  distinction  in  other  schools.  I  think  drawing 
is  a  necessary  means  of  the  expression  of  certain  facts  of  form 
and  means  of  acquaintance  with  them,  as  arithmetic  is  the 
means  of  acrpiaintance  with  facts  of  number.  I  think  the 
facts  which  an  elementary  knowledge  of  drawing  enables  a 
man  to  observe  and  note  are  often  of  as  much  importance  to 
him  as  those  which  he  can  describe  in  words  or  calculate  in 
numbers.  And  I  think  the  cases  in  which  mental  deficiency 
would  prevent  the  acquirement  of  a  serviceable  power  of 
drawing  would  be  found  as  rare  as  those  in  which  no  progress 
could  be  made  in  ai'ithmetic.  I  would  not  desire  this  elemen- 
tary knowledge  to  extend  far,  but  the  limits  which  I  would 
]M-opose  are  not  here  in  question.  While  I  feel  the  force  of 
all  the  admirable  observations  of  Mr.  Hnllah  on  the  use  of  the 
study  of  music,  I  imagine  that  the  cases  of  physical  incapacity 
of  distinguishing  sounds  would  be  too  frequent  to  admit  of 
musical  knowledge  being  made  a  requirement ;  I  would  ash 
for  it,  in  Mr.  Acland's  sense  ;  but  the  drawing  might,  I  think, 
be  required,  as  arithmetic  would  be. 

2.  To  accomplish  the  second  ol)ject  is  the  main  difficulty. 
Touching  which  I  venture  positively  to  state  : 

First.  That  sound  criticism  of  art  is  im|)ossible  to  young 
men,  for  it  consists  principally,  and  in  a  far  more  exclusive 
sense  than  has  yet  been  felt,  in  the  recognition  of  the  facts 
represented  by  the  art.  A  great  artist  represents  many  and 
abstruse  facts ;  it  is  necessary,  in  order  to  judge  of  his  works, 
that  all  those  facts  should  be  experimentally  (not  by  hearsay) 
known  to  the  observer;  whose  recognition  of  them  constitutes 
his  approving  judgment.     A  young  man  cannot  know  them. 

father,  'a  simple  person,  a  laborer  of  the  earth,'  to  the  guardianship  of 
the  painter,  who,  bj^  his  own  work,  had  already  made  the  streets  of  Florence 
ring  with  joy;  attended  him  to  Florence,  and  became  his  disciple." — 
"Giotto  and  his  Works  in  Padua,"  by  John  Buskin,  1854,  p.  12. 


j    1857.  THE   AKTS   AS    A    BKAXCH   OF    EDU(  ATIOX.  '^7 

Criticism  of  art  ])y  youiiiz:  men  must,  therefore,  eoiK>ist 
eitlier  in  the  more  or  less  apt  retailing  and  application  uf 
received  opinions,  or  in  a  more  or  less  immediate  and  dextrous 
use  of  the  knowledge  they  already  possess,  so  as  to  be  able  to 
assert  of  given  works  of  ai-t  that  they  are  true  up  to  a  certain 
point;  the  probability  being  then  that  thoy  are  true  farther 
than  the  young  man  sees. 

The  first  kind  of  criticism  is,  in  general,  useless,  if  not 
harmful  ;  the  second  is  that  which  the  youths  will  em])loy  who 
are  capable  of  becoming  critics  in  after  years, 

Secondly.  All  criticism  of  art,  at  whatever  period  of  life, 
nnist  be  partial ;  wai'ped  more  or  less  by  the  feelings  of  the 
person  endeavoring  to  judge.  Certain  merits  of  art  (as  energy, 
for  instance)  are  pleasant  only  to  certain  temperaments;  and 
certain  tendencies  of  art  (as,  for  instance,  to  religious  sentiment) 
can  only  be  sympathized  with  by  one  order  of  minds.  It  is 
almost  impossible  to  conceive  of  any  mode  of  examination 
which  would  set  the  students  on  anything  like  equitable  foot- 
ing in  such  respects ;  but  their  sensibility  to  art  may  be  gen- 
erally tested. 

Thirdly.  The  history  of  art,  or  the  study,  in  your  accurate 
words,  '' ahout  the  subject,"  is  in  nowise  directly  connected 
witli  the  studies  which  promote  or  detect  art-capacity  or  art- 
judgment.  It  is  quite  possible  to  acquire  the  most  extensive 
and  useful  knowledge  of  the  forms  of  art  existing  in  different 
ages,  and  among  diiferent  nations,  without  thereby  acquiring 
any  power  whatsoever  of  determining  respecting  any  of  them 
(much  less  respecting  a  modern  work  of  art)  whether  it  is  good 
or  bad. 

These  three  facts  being  so,  we  had  perhaps  best  consider, 
first,  wdiat  direction  the  art  studies  of  the  youth  should  take,  as 
that  will  at  once  regulate  the  mode  of  examination. 

First.  He  should  be  encouraged  to  carry  forward  the  prac- 
tical power  of  drawing  he  has  acquired  in  the  elementary 
school.  This  should  be  done  chiefly  by  using  that  ]Knvcr  as  a 
help  in  other  work  :  precision  of  touch  should  be  cultivated  by 
map-drawing  in  his  geography  class;  taste  in  form  by  flower- 


28  LETTERS   OX   ART.  [1857. 

drawing  in  tlie  botanical  schools  ;  and  bone  and  limo  drawing 
in  the  physiological  schools.  Ilis  art,  kept  thus  to  practical 
service,  will  always  be  right  as  far  as  it  goes  ;  there  will  be  no 
affectation  or  shallowness  in  it.  The  work  of  the  drawing- 
master  would  be  at  first  little  more  than  the  exhibition  of  the 
best  means  and  enforcement  of  the  most  perfect  results  in  the 
collateral  studies  of  form. 

Secondly.  His  critical  power  should  be  developed  by  the 
presence  around  him  of  the  best  models,  into  the  excellence  of 
which  his  hioioledge  jmrmits  him  to  enter.  He  should  be 
encouraged,  above  all  things,  to  foim  and  express  judgment  of 
his  own  ;  not  as  if  his  judgment  were  of  any  importance  as 
related  to  the  excellence  of  the  thing,  but  that  both  his  master 
and  he  may  know  precisely  in  wliat  state  his  mind  is.  He 
should  be  told  of  an  Albert  Diirer  engraving,  "  That  is  good, 
whether  you  like  it  or  not ;  but  be  sure  to  determine  ichether 
you  do  or  do  not,  and  why."  All  formal  expressions  of  reasons 
for  opinion,  such  as  a  boy  could  catch  up  and  repeat,  should  be 
withheld  like  poison  ;  and  all  models  which  are  too  good  for 
him  should  be  kept  out  of  his  way.  Contemplation  of  works 
of  art  without  understanding  them  jades  the  faculties  and 
enslaves  the  intelligence.  A  Eembrandt  etching  is  a  better 
example  to  a  boy  than  a  finished  Titian,  and  a  cast  from  a  leaf 
than  one  of  the  Elgin  marbles. 

Thirdly.  I  would  no  more  involve  the  art-schools  in  the 
study  of  the  history  of  art  than  surgical  schools  in  that  of  the 
history  of  surgery.  But  a  general  idea  of  the  influence  of  art 
on  the  human  mind  ought  to  be  given  by  the  study  of  history 
in  the  historical  schools ;  the  effect  of  a  picture,  and  power  of 
a  painter,  being  examined  just  as  carefully  (in  relation  to  its 
extent)  as  tlie  effect  of  a  battle  and  the  power  of  a  general. 
History,  in  its  full  sense,  involves  subordinate  knowledge  of 
all  that  influences  the  acts  of  mankind ;  it  has  hardly  yet  been 
written  at  all,  owing  to  the  want  of  such  subordinate  knowl- 
edge in  the  historians ;  it  has  been  confined  either  to  the  rela- 
tion of  events  by  eye-witnesses  (the  only  valuable  form  of  it), 
or  the  more  or  less  ingenious  collation  of  such  relations.     And 


1857.]  THE   ARTS   AS   A   BRANCH   OF   EDUCATIOX.  29 

it  is  especially  desirable  to  give  history  a  more  arcliicologieal 
range  at  this  period,  so  that  the  class  of  iiiaTiiifactnres  produced 
by  a  city  at  a  given  date  should  be  made  of  more  importance 
in  the  student's  mind  than  the  humors  of  the  factions  that 
governed,  or  details  of  the  accidents  that  preserved  it,  because 
every  day  renders  the  destruction  of  liistorical  memorials  more 
complete  in  Europe  owing  to  the  total  want  of  interest  in  them 
felt  by  its  upper  and  middle  classes. 

Fourthly.  Where  the  faculty  for  art  was  special,  it  ought  to 
be  carried  forward  to  the  study  of  design,  first  in  practical 
application  to  manufacture,  then  in  higher  branches  of  com- 
position. The  general  principles  of  the  application  of  art  .to 
manufacture  should  be  explained  in  all  cases,  whether  of  special 
or  limited  faculty.  Under  this  head  we  may  at  once  get  rid 
of  the  third  question  stated  iu  the  first  page — how  to  detect 
special  gift.  The  power  of  drawing  from  a  given  form 
accurately  would  not  be  enough  to  prove  this :  the  additional 
power  of  design,  w-ith  that  of  eye  for  color,  which  could  be 
tested  in  the  class  concerned  with  manufacture,  would  justify 
the  master  in  advising  and  encouraging  the  youth  to  undertake 
special  pursuit  of  art  as  an  object  of  life. 

It  seems  easy,  on  the  supposition  of  such  a  course  of  study,  to 
conceive  a  mode  of  examination  which  would  test  relative 
excellence.  I  cannot  suggest  the  kind  of  questions  which  ought 
to  be  put  to  the  class  occupied  with  sculpture ;  but  in  my  own 
business  of  painting,  I  should  put,  in  general,  such  tasks  and 
questions  as  these : 

(1)  "  Sketch  such  and  such  an  object  •'  (given  a  difficult  one. 
as  a  bird,  complicated  piece  of  drapery,  or  foliage)  ''  as  com- 
pletely as  you  can  in  light  and  shade  in  half  an  hour." 

(2)  "  Finish  such  and  such  a  portion  of  it "  (given  a  very 
small  portion)  "as  perfectly  as  you  can,  irrespective  of  time." 

(3)  "  Sketch  it  in  color  in  half  an  hour." 

(•i)  "  Design  an  ornament  for  a  given  place  and  purpose." 

(5)  "  Sketch  a  picture  of  a  given  historic^il  event  in  pen 
and  ink." 

(6)  "Sketch  it  in  colors." 


30  LETTERS   OiC   ART.  [1857. 

(7)  "  Name  the  picture  yoii  were  most  interested  in  in  the 
Koyal  Academy  Exhibition  of  this  year.  State  in  writing  what 
you  suppose  to  be  its  principal  merits — fauUs — the  reasons  of 
the  interest  you  took  in  it." 

I  think  it  is  only  the  fourth  of  these  questions  which  would 
admit  of  much  change ;  and  the  seventh,  in  the  name  of  the 
exhibition  ;  the  question  being  asked,  without  previous  knowl- 
edge by  the  students,  respecting  some  one  of  four  or  live 
given  exhibitions  which  should  be  visited  before  the  Exami- 
nation. 

This  being  my  general  notion  of  what  an  Art-Examination 
should  be,  the  second  great  question  remains  of  the  division  of 
schools  and  connection  of  studies. 

Now  I  have  not  yet  considered — I  have  not,  indeed,  knowl- 
edge enough  to  enable  me  to  consider — what  the  practical 
convenience  or  results  of  given  arrangements  would  be.  But 
the  logical  and  harmonious  arrangement  is  surely  a  simple  one  ; 
and  it  seems  to  me  as  if  it  would  not  be  inconvenient,  namely 
(requiring  elementary  drawing  with  arithmetic  in  the  prelimi- 
nary Examination),  that  there  should  then  be  three  advanced 
schools : 

A.  The  School  of  Literature  (occupied  chiefly  in  the  study 

of  human  emotion  and  history). 

B.  The  School  of  Science  (occupied  chiefly  in  the  study  of 

external  facts  and  existences  of  constant  kind). 

c.  The  School  of  Art  (occupied  in  the  development  of 
active  and  productive  human  faculties). 

In  the  school  a,  I  would  include  Composition  in  all  lan- 
guages, Poetry,  History,  Archaeology,  Ethics. 

In  the  school  b,  Mathematics,  Political  Economy,  the  Physi- 
cal Sciences  (including  Geography  and  Medicine). 

In  the  school  c,  Painting,  Sculpture,  including  Architecture, 
Agriculture,  Manufacture,  War,  Music,  Bodily  Exercises  (Navi- 
gation in  seaport  schools),  including  laws  of  health. 

I  should  require,  for  a  first  class,  proficiency  in  two  schools ; 
not,  of  course,  in  all  the  subjects  of  each  chosen  school,  but  in 
a  well-chosen  and  combined  group  of  them.     Tims,  I  should 


1857.]  THE   ARTS   AS  A   BRANCH   OF   EDUCATION.  31 

call  a  very  good  first-class  man  one  who  had  got  some  snch 
range  of  subjects,  and  snch  proiiciency  in  each,  as  this : 

English,  Greek,  and  Mediieval-Italian  Literature High. 

English  and  French  History,  and  Archajology Average. 

Conic  Sections Thorough,  as  far  as  learnt. 

Political  Economy Thorough,  as  far  as  learnt. 

Botany,  or  Chemistry,  or  Physiology High. 

Painting Average. 

Music Average. 

Bodily  Exercises High. 

I  have  written  you  a  sadly  long  letter,  but  I  could  not 
manage  to  get  it  shorter. 

Believe  me,  my  dear  Sir, 

Yery  faithfully  and  respectfully  yours, 

J.  KUSKIN. 
Rev.  F.  Temple. 

Perhaps  I  had  better  add  what  to  you,  but  not  to  every  one 
who  considers  such  a  scheme  of  education,  would  be  palpable 
— that  the  main  value  of  it  v\^ould  be  brought  out  by  judicious 
involution  of  its  studies.  This,  for  instance,  would  be  the  kind 
of  Examination  Paper  I  should  hope  for  in  the  Botaniciil 
Class : 

1.  State  the  habit  of  such  and  such  a  plant. 

2.  Sketch  its  leaf,  and  a  portion  of  its  ramifications 
(memory). 

3.  Explain  the  mathematical  laws  of  its  growth  and  struc- 
ture. 

4.  Give  the  composition  of  its  juices  in  different  seasons. 

5.  Its  uses  ?  Its  relations  to  other  families  of  plants,  and 
conceivable  uses  beyond  those  known  ? 

6.  Its  commercial  value  in  London  ?     Mode  of  cultivation  ? 

7.  Its  mythological  meaning?  The  commonest  or  most 
beautiful  fables  respecting  it? 

8.  Quote  any  important  references  to  it  by  great  poets. 

9.  Time  of  its  introduction. 

10.  Describe  its  consequent  inflnence  on  eivihzation. 


'^"^  LETTERS    OX   ART.  [1866. 

Of  all  these  ten  questions,  there  is  not  one  which  does  not 
test  the  student  in  other  studies  than  botany.  Thus,  1,  Geog- 
raphy ;  2,  Drawing ;  3,  Mathematics ;  4,  5,  Chemistry  •  6,'  Politi- 
cal Economy ;  7,  8,  9,  10,  Literature. 

Of  course  the  plants  required  to  be  thus  studied  could  be 
but  few,  and  would  rationally  be  chosen  from  the  most  useful 
of  foreign  plants,  and  those  common  and  indigenous  in  Eng- 
land.    All   sciences  should,  I  think,  be  taught  more  for  the 
sake  of  tlieir  facts,  and  less  for  that  of  their  system,  than  here- 
tofore.    Comprehensive  and  connected  views  are  impossible  to 
most  men ;  the  systems  they  learn  are  nothing  but  skeletons 
to  them ;  but  nearly  all  men  can  understand  the  relations  of  a 
few  facts  bearing  on  daily  business,  and  to  be  exemplified  in 
common  substances.     And  science  will  soon  be  so  vast  that  the 
most  com])rehensive  men  will  still  be  narrow,  and  we  shall  see 
tlie  fitness  of  rather  teaching  our  youth  to  concentrate  their 
general  intelligence  highly  on  given  points  than   scatter  it 
towards  an  infinite  horizon  from  which  they  can  fetch  nothing, 
and  to  which  they  can  carry  nothing. 


iFrom  "  Nature  and  Art,"  December  1,  1866.1 
AMT-TEAGHING  BY  CORRESPONDENCE. 

Dear  Mr.  Williams:*  I  like  your  plan  of  teaching  by  letter 
exceedmgly  :  and  not  only  so,  but  have  myself  adopted  it 
largely,  with  the  help  of  an  intelligent  under-master,  whose 
operations  however,  so  far  from  interfering  with,  you  will 
much  facilitate,  if  you  can  bring  tliis  literary  way  of  teaching 
mto  more  accepted  practice.  I  wish  we  had  more  drawing- 
masters  who  were  able  to  give  instruction  definite  enough  to 

liamV/ol'snnn/''';  ^V^P^T'  "'^^'"""^  ^^^resse^  to  an  artist.  Mr.  Wil- 
liams (of  Southampton),  and  was  then  printed,  some  years  la  er  in  the 
number  of  Nature  and  Art  above  referred  to 


1866.]  ART-TEACHING   BY   CORRESPONDENCE.  33 

be  expressed  in  writing :  many  can  teach  nothing  but  a  few 
tricks  of  the  brush,  and  have  nothing  to  write,  because  nothing 

to  tell. 

With  every  wish  for  your  success,— a  wish  which  I  make 
quite  as  much  in  your  pupils'  interest  as  in  your  own,— 
Believe  me,  always  faithfully  yours, 

J.    IIUSKIN. 
Denmark  Hill,  November,  1860. 


I 


LETTERS   ON  AET. 


II. 

PUBLIC  INSTITUTIONS  AND   THE  NATIONAL 
GALLERY. 

Danger  to  the  National  Gallery.    1847. 

The  National  Gallery.    1852. 

The  British   Museum.     1866. 

On  the  Purchase  of  Pictures.     1880. 


11. 

PUBLIC  INSTITUTIONS  AND  THE  NATIONAL 
GALLERY. 

[From  "The  Times,"'  January  7,  1847.] 

DANGER  TO  THE  NATIONAL  OALLERT* 

To  tJie  Editor  o/  "  The  Times." 

Sir  :  As  I  am  sincerely  desirous  that  a  stop  may  be  put  to 
the  dangerous  process  of  cleaning  lately  begun  in  our  National 
Gallery,  and  as  I  believe  that  what  is  right  is  most  effectively 
when  most  kindly  advocated,  and  what  is  true  most  convinc- 
ingly when  least  passionately  asserted,  I  was  grieved  to  see  tho 
violent  attack  upon  Mr.  Eastlake  in  your  columns  of  Friday 
la§t ;  yet  not  less  surprised  at  the  attempted  defence  which 
appeared  in  them  yesterday.f     The  outcry  which  has  arisen 

*  Some  words  are  necessary  to  explain  this  and  the  following  letter.  In 
the  autumn  of  1846  a  correspondence  was  opened  in  the  columns  of  The 
Times  on  the  subject  of  the  cleaning  and  restoration  of  the  national  pictures 
during  the  previous  vacation.  Mr.  (afterwards  Sir  Charles)  Eastlake  was  at 
this  time  Keeper  of  the  Gallery,  though  he  resigned  office  soon  after  this 
letter  was  written,  partly  in  consequence  of  the  attacks  which  had  been 
made  upon  him.  He  was  blamed,  not  only  for  restoring  good  pictures,  but 
also  for  buying  bad  ones,  and  in  particular  the  purchase  of  a  "  libel  on 
Holbein"  was  quoted  against  him.  The  attack  was  led  by  the  picture-dealer, 
and  at  one  time  artist,  Mr.  Morris  ]\[oore,  writing  at  first  under  the  pseu- 
donym of  "  Verax,"  and  afterwards  m  his  own  name.  He  continued  his 
opposition  through  several  years,  especially  during  1850  and  1852.  He  also 
published  some  pamphlets  on  the  subject,  amongst  them  one  entitled  "  The 
Revival  of  Vandalism  at  the  National  Gallery,  a  reply  to  John  Riiskin  and 
others"  (London,  Ollivier,  1853).  The  whole  discussion  may  be  gatliered  in 
all  its  details  from  the  Parliamentary  Report  of  the  Select  Conunittee  on  the 
National  Gallery  in  1853. 

f  The  "violent  attack"  alludes  to  a  letter  of  "Verax"  in  TJie  Times  of 
Thursday  (not  Friday),  December  31,  1846.  and  the  "  attempted  defence"  to 
another  letter  signed  "A.  G."  in  The  Times  of  January  4,  two  days  (not  (ht 
day)  before  Mr.  Ruskin  wrote  the  present  letter. 


i 


38  LETTEHS   OX   ART.  [1847. 

upon  tills  subject  has  been  just,  but  it  lias  been  too  loud ;  the 
injury  done  is  neither  so  great  nor  so  wilful  as  has  been 
asserted,  and  I  fear  that  the  resj^ect  which  might  have  been 
paid'  to  remonstrance  may  be  refused  to  clamor. 

I  was  inclined  at  first  to  join  as  loudly  as  any  in  the  hue 
and  cry.  Accustomed,  as  I  have  been,  to  look  to  England  as 
the  refuge  of  the  pictorial  as  of  all  other  distress,  and  to  hope 
that,  having  no  high  art  of  her  own,  she  would  at  least  protect 
what  she  could  not  produce,  and  respect  what  she  could 
not  restore,  I  could  not  but  look  upon  the  attack  which 
has  been  made  upon  the  pictures  in  question  as  on  the  vio- 
lation of  a  sanctuary.  I  had  seen  in  Yenice  the  noblest 
works  of  Veronese  painted  over  with  flake-white  with  a 
brush  fit  for  tarring  ships ;  ^  had  seen  in  Florence  Angelico's 
highest  inspiration  rotted  and  seared  into  fragments  of  old 
wood,  burnt  into  blisters,  or  blotted  into  glutinous  maps  of 
iftildew ;  -  I  had  seen  in  Paris  Kaphael  restored  by  David  and 
Yernet ;  and  I  returned  to  England  in  the  one  last  trust  that, 
though  her  National  Gallery  was  an  European  jest,  her  art 
a  shadow,  and  her  connoisseurship  an  hypocrisy,  though  she 
neither  knew  how  to  cherish  nor  how  to  choose,  and  lay  ex- 
posed to  the  cheats  of  every  vender  of  old  canvas — yet  that 
such  good  pictures  as  through  chance  or  oversight  miglit  find 
their  way  beneath  that  preposterous  portico,  and  into  those 
melancholy  and  miserable  rooms,  were  at  least  to  be  vindicated 
thenceforward  from  the  mercy  of  republican,  priest,  or  painter, 
safe  alike  from  musketry,  monkery,  and  manipulation. 

But  whatever  pain  I  may  feel  at  the  dissipation  of  this 
dream,  I  am  not  disposed  altogether  to  deny  the  necessity  of 
some  illuminatory  process  with  respect  to  pictures  exposed  to  a 
London  atmosphere  and  populace.  Dust  an  inch  thick,  accu- 
mulated upon  the  panes  in  the  course  of  the  day,  and  darkness 
closing  over  the  canvas  like  a  curtain,  attest  too  forcibly  the 
influence  on  floor  and  air  of  the  ''  mutable,  rank-scented,  many." 

*  "The  Crucifixion,  or  Adoration  of  the  Cross,"  in  the  church  of  San 
Marco.  An  engraving  of  this  picture  may  be  found  in  Mrs.  Jameson's 
"History  of  our  Lord,"  V(l.  i.  p.  180. 


k 


1847.]  DANGER   TO   THE   XATIOXAI,   GALLERY.  39 

It  is  of  little  use  to  be  over-anxious  for  the  preservation  of 
pictm-es  wliicli  we  cannot  see ;  the  only  question  is,  whether 
in  the  present  instance  the  process  may  not  have  been  carried 
perilously  far,  and  whether  in  future  simpler  and  safer  means 
may  not  be  adopted  to  remove  the  coat  of  dust  and  smoke, 
without  alfecting  either  the  glazing  of  the  picture,  or,  what  is 
almost  as  precious,  the  mellow  tone  left  by  time. 

As  regards  the  '*  Peace  and  War,"  *  I  have  no  hesitation  in 
asserting  that  for  the  present  it  is  utterly  and  forever  partiallv 
destroyed.  I  am  not  disposed  lightly  to  impugn  the  judgment 
of  Mr.  Eastlake,  but  this  was  indisputably  of  all  the  pictures  in 
the  Gallery  that  which  least  required,  and  least  could  endure, 
the  process  of  cleaning.  It  was  in  the  most  advantageous 
condition  under  which  a  work  of  Rubens  can  be  seen ;  mel- 
lowed by  time  into  more  perfect  harmony  than  when  it  left 
the  easel,  enriched  and  warmed,  without  losing  any  of  its 
freshness  or  energy.  The  execution  of  the  master  is  always  so 
bold  and  frank  as  to  be  completely,  perhaps  even  most  agree- 
ably, seen  under  circumstances  of  obscurity,  which  would  be 
injurious  to  pictures  of  greater  refinement ;  and,  though  this 
was,  indeed,  one  of  his  most  highly  finished  and  careful  works 
(to  my  mind,  before  it  suffered  this  recent  injury,  far  superior 
to  everything  at  Antwerp,  Malines,  or  Cologne),  this  was  a 
more  Aveighty  reason  for  caution  than  for  interference.  Some 
portions  of  color  have  been  exhibited  which  were  formerly 
untraceable  ;  but  even  these  have  lost  in  power  what  they  have 
gained  in  definiteness — the  majesty  and  preciousness  of  all  the 
tones  are  departed,  the  balance  of  distances  lost.  Time  may 
perhaps  restore  something  of  the  glow,  but  never  the  subordina 
tion  ;  and  the  more  delicate  portions  of  flesh  tint,  especially  the 
back  of  the  female  figure  on  the  left,  and  of  the  boy  in  the 
centre,  are  destroyed  forever. 

The  large  Cuypf  is,  I  think,  nearly  uninjured.      Many 

*  No.  46  in  the  National  Gallery. 

f  "Landscape,  with  Cattle  and  Figures— Evening"  (No.  53).  Since  the 
bequest  of  the  somewhat  higher  "  large  Dorfin  1876  (No.  961),  it  has  ceased 
to  be  "the  large  Cuyp." 


40  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1847. 

portions  of  the  foreground  painting  have  been  revealed,  which 
were  before  only  to  be  traced  painfully,  if  at  all.  The  dis- 
tance has  indeed  lost  the  appearance  of  sunny  haze,  which  was 
its  chief  charm,  but  this  I  have  little  doubt  it  originally  did 
not  possess,  and  in  process  of  time  may  recover. 

The  "  Bacchus  and  Ariadne"  "  of  Titian  has  escaped  so  scot 
free  that,  not  knowing  it  had  been  cleaned,  I  passed  it  without 
noticing  any  change.  I  observed  only  that  the  blue  of  the 
distance  was  more  intense  than  I  had  previously  thought  it, 
though,  four  years  ago,  I  said  of  that  distance  that  it  was 
"  difficult  to  imagine  anything  more  magnificently  impossible, 
not  from  its  vividness,  but  because  it  is  not  faint  and  aerial 
enough,  to  account  for  its  purity  of  color.  There  is  so  total 
a  want  of  atmosphere  in  it,  that  but  for  the  difference  of  form 
it  would  be  impossible  to  distinguish  the  mountains  from  the 
robe  of  x\riadne."  f 

Your  correspondent  is  alike  unacquainted  with  the  previous 
condition  of  this  picture,  and  with  the  character  of  Titian  dis- 
tances in  general,  when  he  complains  of  a  loss  of  aerial  quality 
resulting  in  the  present  case  from  cleaning. 

I  unfortunately  did  not  see  the  new  Yelasquez  %  until  it 
had  undergone  its  discipline ;  but  I  have  seldom  met  with  an 
example  of  the  master  which  gave  me  more  delight,  or  which 
I  believe  to  be  in  more  genuine  or  perfect  condition.  I  saw  no 
traces  of  the  retouching  which  is  hinted  at  by  your  corre- 
spondent "  Yerax,"  nor  are  the  touches  on  that  canvas  such  as 
to  admit  of  very  easy  or  untraceable  interpolation  of  meaner 
handling.  His  complaint  of  loss  of  substance  in  the  figures  of 
the  foreground  is,  I  have  no  doubt,  altogether  groundless.  He 
has  seen  little  southern  scenery  if  he  supposes  that  the  brilliancy 
and  apparent  nearness  of  the  silver  clouds  is  in  the  slightest 
degree  overcharged  ;  and  shows  little  appreciation  of  Yelasquez 

t  ''  Modern  Painters,"  vol.  i.  p.  146. 

*  No.  35  in  the  National  Gallery.  This  and  the  two  pictures  already  men- 
tioned -were  the  typical  instances  of  "spoilt  pictures,"  quoted  by  "  Verax." 

X  "Philip  IV.  of  Spain,  hunting  the  Wild  Boar"  (No.  197),  purchased 
in  1846. 


1847.J  DAXGEIl   TO    THE    NATIONAL   GALLEIIY.  41 

in  sii])po.siiig  liiiii  to  have  sucriticed  the  suleiiiiiity  and  might 
of  sucli  a  distance  to  the  inferior  interest  of  tlie  tigures  in  the 
foreground.  Had  he  studied  the  picture  attentively,  he  might 
have  observed  that  the  position  of  the  horizon  suggests,  and 
the  lateral  extent  of  the  foreground  jjrovest^  such  a  distance 
between  the  spectator  and  even  its  nearest  Hgures  as  may  well 
justify  the  slightness  of  their  execution. 

Ev^en  granting  that  some  of  the  upj^er  glazings  of  tlie 
figures  had  been  removed,  the  tone  of  the  whole  picture  is  so 
light,  gray,  and  glittering,  and  the  dependence  on  the  power 
of  its  whites  so  absolute,  that  I  think  the  process  hardly  to 
be  regretted  which  has  left  these  in  lustre  so  precious,  and 
restored  to  a  brilliancy  which  a  comparison  with  any  mo<lern 
work  of  similar  aim  would  render  apparently  supernatural, 
the  sparkling  motion  of  its  figures  and  the  serene  snow  of  its 
sky. 

I  believe  I  have  stated  to  its  fullest  extent  all  the  harm  that 
has  yet  been  done,  yet  I  earnestly  protest  against  any  con- 
tinuance of  the  treatment  to  which  these  pictures  have  been 
subjected.  It  is  useless  to  allege  that  nothing  but  discolored 
varnish  has  been  withdrawn,  for  it  is  perfectly  possible  to  alter 
the  structure  and  continuity,  and  so  destroy  the  aerial  relations 
of  colors  of  which  no  part  has  been  removed.  I  have  seen 
the  dark  blue  of  a  water-color  drawing  made  opaque  and  pale 
merely  by  mounting  it ;  and  even  supposing  no  other  injury 
were  done,  every  time  a  picture  is  cleaned  it  loses,  like  a  restored 
building,  part  of  its  authority;  and  is  thenceforward  liable  to 
dispute  and  suspicion,  every  one  of  its  beauties  open  to  ques- 
tion, while  its  faults  are  screened  from  accusation.  It  cannot 
be  any  more  reasoned  from  with  security;  for,  though  allow- 
ance may  be  made  for  the  effect  of  time,  no  one  can  calculate  the 
arbitrary  and  accidental  changes  occasioned  by  violent  clean- 
ing. Xone  of  the  varnishes  should  be  attacked  ;  whatever 
the  medium  used,  nothing  but  soot  and  dust  should  be  taken 
away,  and  that  chiefly  by  delicate  and  patient  friction  ;  and, 
in  order  to  protract  as  long  as  possible  the  necessity  even  for  this 
all  the  important  pictures  in  the  gallery  should  at  once  be  put 


42  LETTERS    ON   ART.  [1847. 

under  glass,"  and  closed,  not  merely  bj  liinged  doors,  like  the 
Corregglu,  but  j^erniunently  and  securely.  I  should  be  glad  to 
see  this  dune  in  all  rich  galleries,  but  it  is  peculiarly  necessary 
in  the  case  of  pictures  exposed  in  London,  and  to  a  crowd 
freely  admitted  four  days  in  the  week ;  it  would  do  good  also 
by  necessitating  the  enlargement  of  the  rooms,  and  tlie  bring- 
ing down  of  all  the  pictures  to  the  level  of  the  eye.  Every 
picture  that  is  worth  buying  or  retaining  is  worth  exhibiting 
in  its  proper  place,  and  if  its  scale  be  large,  and  its  handling 
rough,  there  is  the  more  instruction  to  l)e  gained  by  close  study 
of  the  various  means  adopted  by  the  master  to  secure  his  dis- 
tant effect.  We  can  certainly  spare  both  the  ground  and  the 
funds  wliich  would  enable  us  to  exhibit  pictures  for  which  no 
price  is  thouglit  too  large,  and  for  all  j^urposes  of  study  and 
for  most  of  enjoyment  pictures  are  useless  when  they  are  even 
a  little  above  the  hue.  The  fatigue  complained  of  by  most 
persons  in  examining  a  picture  gallery  is  attributable,  not  only 
to  the  number  of  works,  but  to  their  confused  order  of  suc- 
cession, and  to  the  straining  of  the  sight  in  endeavoring  to 
penetrate  the  details  of  those  above  the  eye.  Every  gallery 
should  be  long  enough  to  admit  of  its  whole  collection  being 
hung  in  one  line,  side  by  side,  and  wide  enough  to  allow  of 
the  spectators  retiring  to  the  distance  at  which  the  largest  23ic- 
ture  was  intended  to  be  seen.  The  works  of  every  master 
should  be  brought  together  and  arranged  in  chronological 
order ;  and  such  drawings  or  engravings  as  may  exist  in  the 
collection,  either  of,  or  for,  its  pictures,  or  in  any  way  illus- 
trative of  them,  should  be  placed  in  frames  opposite  each,  in 
the  middle  of  the  room. 

But,  Sir,  the  subjects  of  regret  connected  with  the  present 

*  On  this  and  other  collateral  subjects  the  reader  is  referred  to  the  next 
letter;  to  Mr.  Ruskin's  evidence  before  the  National  Gallery  Commission 
in  1857;  and  to  the  Appendix  to  his  Notes  on  the  Turner  Gallery  at  Marl- 
borough House,  1856-7.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  state  that  a  very  large  num- 
ber of  the  national  pictures,  especially  the  Turners,  are  now  preserved  under 
glass.  Of  the  other  strictures  here  pronounced,  some  are  no  longer  deserved ; 
and  it  may  well  be  remembered  that  at  the  time  this  letter  was  written  the 
National  Gallery  had  been  founded  less  than  five-and-twenty  years. 


1847.]  DAXGER    TO    THE    NATIONAL   fiALLKRY.  43 

management  of  our  national  collection  are  nut  to  be  limited 
eitlier  to  its  treatment  or  its  arrangement.  The  principles  uf 
selection  which  have  been  acted  upon  in  the  course  of  the  last 
five  or  six  years  have  been  as  extraordinary  as  unjustitiable. 
Whatever  may  he  the  intrinsic  power,  interest,  or  artistical  abil- 
ity of  the  earlier  essays  of  any  school  of  art,  it  cannot  be  dis- 
puted that  characteristic  examples  of  every  one  of  its  most 
important  phases  should  form  part  of  a  national  collection  : 
granting  them  of  little  value  individually,  their  collective 
teaching  is  of  irrefragable  authority;  and  the  exhibition  of 
perfected  results  alone,  while  the  course  of  national  ])rogress 
throutjli  which  these  were  reached  is  altof^ether  concealed,  is 
more  likely  to  discourage  than  to  assist  the  efforts  of  an  unde- 
veloped school.  Granting  even  what  the  shallowest  material- 
ism of  modern  artists  would  assume,  that  the  works  of  Peru- 
gino  were  of  no  value,  but  as  they  taught  Raphael ;  that  John 
Bellini  is  altogether  absorbed  and  overmastered  by  Titian; 
that  ^N^ino  Pisano  was  utterly  superseded  b}^  Bandinelli  or 
Cellini,  and  Ghirlandajo  sunk  in  the  shadow  of  Buonaroti : 
granting  Yan  Eyck  to  be  a  mere  mechanist,  and  Giotto  a 
mere  child,  and  Angelico  a  supei*stitious  monk,  and  whatever 
you  choose  to  grant  that  ever  blindness  deemed  or  insolence 
affirmed,  still  it  is  to  be  maintained  and  proved,  that  if  we 
wish  to  have  a  Buonaroti  or  a  Titian  of  our  own,  we  shall  with 
more  wisdom  learn  of  those  of  whom  Buonaroti  and  Titian 
learned,  and  at  Avhose  knees  they  were  brought  up,  and  whom 
to  their  day  of  death  they  ever  revered  and  worshipped,  than 
of  those  wretched  pu])ils  and  partisans  who  sank  every  high 
function  of  art  into  a  form  and  a  faction,  betrayed  her  trusts, 
darkened  her  traditions,  overthrew  her  throne,  and  left  us 
where  we  now  are,  stuml)ling  among  its  fragments.  Sir,  if  the 
canvases  of  Guido,  lately  introduced  into  the  gallery,*  had 
been  works  of  the  best  of  those  pupils,  which  they  are  not  : 
if  they  had  been  good  works  of  even  that  bad  master,  which 

*  "Lot  and  his  Daughters  Leaving  Sodom"  (No.  193),  bequeathed  to  the 
gallery  ia  1844;  and  "Susannah  and  the  Elders"  (No.  196).  purchased  in 
the  same  vear. 


44  LETTERS   0>^   ART.  [1847. 

they  are  not ;  if  tliey  liad  been  genuine  and  untouched  works, 
even  though  feeble,  winch  they  are  not ;  if,  thougli  false  and 
retouched  remnants  of  a  feeble  and  fallen  school,  they  had 
been  eudurably  decent  or  elementarily  instructive — some  con- 
ceivable excuse  might  perhaps  have  been  by  ingenuity  forged, 
and  by  impudence  uttered,  for  their  introduction  into  a  gal- 
lery where  we  previously  possessed  two  good  Guidos,*  and  no 
Perugino  (for  the  attribution  to  him  of  the  w^retched  panel 
which  now  bears  his  name  is  a  mere  insult),  no  Angelico,  no 
Fra  Bartolomeo,  no  Albertinelli,  no  Ghirlandajo,  no  Verrochio, 
no  Lorenzo  di  Credi — (what  shall  I  more  say,  for  the  time 
would  fail  me  i)  But  now,  Sir,  what  vestige  of  apology  remains 
for  the  cumbering  our  walls  with  pictui-es  that  have  no  single 
virtue,  no  color,  no  drawing,  no  character,  no  history,  no 
thought  ?  Yet  2,000  guineas  were,  I  believe,  given  for  one 
of  those  encumbrances,  and  5,000  for  the  coarse  and  unneces- 
sary E.ubens,f  added  to  a  room  half  filled  with  Eubens  before, 
while  a  mighty  and  perfect  work  of  Angelico  was  sold  from 
Cardinal  Fesch's  collection  for  1,5004     I  do  not  speak  of  the 

*  The  "two  good  Guidos"  previously  possessed  are  the  "  St.  Jerome" 
(No.  11)  and  the  "  Magdalen"  (No,  177).  The  "wretched  panel"  is  No. 
181,  "  The  Virgin  and  Infant  Christ  with  St.  John."  For  the  rest,  the  gal- 
lery now  includes  two  other  Peruginos,  ' '  The  Virgin  adoring  the  Infant 
Christ,  the  Archangel  Michael,  the  Archangel  Raphael  and  Tobias"  (No. 
288),  three  panels,  purchased  in  1856,  and  the  very  recent  (1879)  purchase 
of  the  "Virgin  and  Child  with  St.  Jerome  and  St.  Francis"  (No.  1075).  It 
boasts  also  two  Angelicos — "The  Adoration  of  the  Magi"  (No.  582)  and 
"Christ  amid  the  Blessed"  (No.  663),  purchased  in  1857  and  1860  ;  one 
Albertinelli,  "Virgin  and  Child  "(No.  645),  also  purchased  in  1860;  and 
two  Lorenzo  di  Credis,  both  of  the  "Virgin  and  Child  "  (Nos.  593  and  648), 
purchased  in  1857  and  1865.  But  it  still  possesses  no  Fra  Bartolomeo,  no 
Ghirlandajo,  and  no  Verrochio. 

\  "The  Judgment  of  Paris"  (No.  194),  purchased  from  Mr.  Penrice's 
collection  in  1846. 

X  "The  Last  Judgment;"  its  purchaser  was  the  Earl  of  Dudley,  in 
whose  possession  the  picture,  now  hanging  at  Dudley  House  in  London, 
has  ever  since  remained.  An  engraving  of  this  work  (pronounced  the  finest 
of  Angelico's  four  representations  of  this  subject),  may  be  found  in  Mrs. 
Jameson's  "History  of  our  Lord,"  vol.  ii.  p.  414.  Cardinal  Fesch  w'as 
Archbishop  of  Lyons,  and  the  uncle  of  Napoleon  Buonaparte.  His  gallery 
contained  in  its  time  the  finest  private  collection  of  pictures  in  Rome. 


1852.]  THE    NATIONAL   GALLERY.  46 

spurious  Holbeiu,*  for  though  the  veriest  tyro  might  well  he 
ashamed  of  such  a  purchase,  it  would  have  been  a  judicious 
addition  had  it  been  genuine  ;  so  was  the  John  Dellini,  so  was 
the  Yan  Eyek;  but  the  mighty  Venetian  master,  who  alone  of 
all  the  painters  of  Italy  united  purity  of  religious  aim  with 
perfection  of  artistical  power,  is  p(^orly  re2)resented  l»y  a  single 
head  ;t  and  I  ask,  in  the  name  of  the  earnest  students  of  Eng- 
land, that  the  funds  set  a])art  for  her  gallery  may  no  longer  be 
played  with  like  pebbles  in  London  auction-rooms.  Let  agents 
be  seiit  to  all  the  cities  of  Italy  ;  let  the  noble  ])ictures  which 
are  perishing  there  be  rescued  from  the  invisibility  and  ill- 
treatment  which  their  position  too  commonly  implies,  and  let 
us  have  a  national  collection  which,  however  imperfect,  shall 
be  orderly  and  continuous,  and  shall  exhibit  with  something 
like  relative  candor  and  justice  the  claims  to  our  reverence  of 
those  great  and  ancient  builders,  whose  mighty  foundation  has 
been  for  two  centuries  concealed  by  wood,  and  hay,  and  stub- 
ble, the  distorted  growing,  and  thin  gleaning  of  vain  men  in 
blasted  fields. 

I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir, 

Your  obedient  servant, 

The  Author  of  "  Modekn  Paintees." 
January  6. 


[From  "  The  Times.'  December  29, 1852.1 

THE  NATIONAL  GALLERY. 


To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times." 

SiK  :  I  trust  that  the  excitement  which  has  been  caused  by 
the  alleged  destruction  of  some  of  the  most  important  pictures  in 
the  National  Gallery  will  not  be  without  results,  whatever  may 

*  The  "libel  on  Holbein"  was  bought  as  an  original,  from  Mr,  Hodiard. 
in  1845.  It  now  figures  in  the  National  Gallery  as  "  A  Medical  Professor, 
— artist  unknown"  (Xo.  195). 

t  The  Bellini  is  the  "Portrait  of  Doge  Leonardo  Loredano"  (No.  189). 
purchased  in  1844:  four  more  examples  (Xos.  280,  726,  808,  812)  of  llic 


4:6  LETTERS    OX    ART.  [1852. 

be  tlie  facts  of  the  case  with  respect  to  the  works  in  question. 
Under  the  name  of  "  restoration,"  the  ruin  of  the  noblest 
arcliitecture  and  painting  is  constant  throughout  Europe.  AVe 
shall  show  ourselves  wiser  than  our  neighbors  if  the  loss  of  two 
Claudes  and  the  injury  of  a  Paul  Veronese*  induce  us  to  pay 
so  much  attention  to  the  preservation  of  ancient  art  as  may 
prevent  it  from  becoming  a  disputed  question  in  future  whether 
they  are  indeed  pictures  which  we  possess  or  their  skeletons. 

As  to  the  facts  in  the  present  instance,  I  can  give  no 
opinion.  Sir  Charles  Eastlake  and  Mr.  Uwinsf  know  more 
than  1  of  oil  paintings  in  general,  and  have  far  more  profound 
respect  for  those  of  Claude  in  particular.  I  do  not  suppose 
they  would  have  taken  from  him  his  golden  armor  that  Turner 
might  bear  away  a  dishonorable  victory  m  the  noble  passage  of 
arms  to  which  he  has  challenged  his  rival  from  the  grave.:}; 
Nor  can  the  public  suppose  that  the  Curators  of  the  National 
Gallery  have  any  interest  in  destroying  the  works  with  which 
they  are  intrusted.     If,  acting  to  the  best  of  their  judgment, 

I  The  public  may  not,  perhaps,  be  generally  aware  that  the  con- 
dition by  which  the  nation  retains  the  two  pictures  bequeathed 
to  it  by  Turner,  and  now  in  the  National  Gallery,  is  that  *^they 
shall  be  hung  beside  Claude's."  § 

same  "mighty  Venetian  master"  have  since  been  introduced,  so  that  he  is 
DO  longer  "poorly  represented  by  a  single  head."  The  Van  Eyck  is  the 
"  Portrait  of  Jean  Arnolfini  and  his  Wife"  (No.  186),  purchased  in  1842. 

*  Claude's  "Marriage  of  Isaac  and  Rebecca"  (No.  12),  and  his  "Queen 
of  Sheba"  picture  (No.  14,  Seaport,  with  figures).  The  only  pictures  of 
Veronese  which  the  Gallery  at  this  time  contained,  were  the  "  Consecration 
of  St.  Nicholas"  (No.  26),  and  the  "  Rape  of  Europa"  (No.  97).  It  is  the 
former  of  these  two  that  is  here  spoken  of  as  injured  (see  the  Report  of  the 
National  Gallery  Committee  in  1853). 

fMr.  Thomas  Uwins,  R.A.,  had  succeeded  Sir  Charles  Eastlake  as 
Keeper  of  the  National  Gallery  in  1847;  and  resigned,  for  a  similar  reason, 
in  1855. 

§  "  Dido  building  Carthage"  (No.  498),  and  "  The  Sun  rising  in  a  Mist" 
(No.  479).  The  actual  wording  of  Turner's  will  on  the  matter  ran  thus: 
"  I  direct  that  the  said  pictures,  or  paintings,  shall  be  hung,  kept,  and 
placed,  that  is  to  sa^^  always  between  the  two  pictures  painted  by  Claude, 
the  Seaport  and  the  Mill."  Accordingly  they  now  hang  side  by  side  with 
these  two  pictures  (Nos.' 5  and  12)  in  the  National  Gallery. 


1853.]  THE    XATIOXAL    GALLERY.  47 

tliev  liave  done  harm,  to  wliuiii  are  we  to  look  for  irreuter 
])ru<lence  or  better  success^  Are  tlie  public  prepared  to  with- 
draw their  contideiice  froiu  Sir  C.  Eastlake  and  the  iiieinbei*8 
of  the  Royal  Academy,  and  entrust  the  national  iiroj>erty  to 
^[r.  Morris  Moore,  or  to  any  of  the  artists  and  amateurs  who 
have  iniiamed  the  sheets  of  The  Times  with  their  indiii^nation  ? 
Is  it  not  evident  that  the  only  security  which  the  nation  can 
j^ossess  for  its  pictures  must  be  found  in  taking  such  measures 
{:s  may  in  future  prevent  the  necessity  of  their  being-  touched 
at  all  ?  For  this  is  very  certain,  that  all  question  respecting 
the  effects  of  cleaning  is  merely  one  of  the  amount  of  injury. 
Every  picture  which  has  undergone  more  friction  than  is 
necessary  at  intervals  for  the  removal  of  dust  or  dirt,  has 
sutfered  injury  to  some  extent.  The  last  touches  of  the  master 
leave  thesm-face  of  the  color  with  a  certain  substantial  texture, 
the  bloom  of  which,  if  once  reached  under  the  varnish,  nmst 
inevitably  be  more  or  less  removed  by  friction  of  any  kind — 
how  much  more  by  friction  aided '  by  solvents  ?  I  am  well 
assured  that  every  possessor  of  pictures  who  truly  loves  them, 
would  keep — if  it  might  be — their  surf  aces  from  being  so  touch 
as  breathed  upon,  which  may,  indeed,  be  done,  and  done  easily. 
Every  stranger  who  enters  our  Xational  Gallery,  if  he  be 
a  thoughtful  person,  must  assuredly  put  to  himself  a  curious 
question.  Perceiving  that  certain  pictui-es — namely,  three 
Correggios,  two  Eaphaels  and  a  John  Bellini — are  put  under 
glass,""  and  that  all  the  others  are  left  exposed,  as  oil  pictures 
are  in  ireneral,  he  nmst  ask  himself,  "  Is  it  an  ascertained  fact 
that  glass  preserves  pictures  ;  and  are  none  of  the  pictures  here 
thought  worth  a  pane  of  glass  but  these  five  ?  f  Or  is  it 
unascertained  whether  glass  is  beneficial  or  injurious,  and  have 
the  Raphaels  and  Correggios  been  selected  for  the  trial — '  Fi<it 
rxperhncntum  in  corpore  vUl  ?  ' ''  Some  years  ago  it  might 
have  been  difficult  to  answer  him ;  now  the  answer  is  easy, 
though  it  be  strange.  The  experiment  has  been  made.  The 
Raphaels  and   Correggios  have  been  under   glass  for  many 

*  See  p.  42,  note. 

f  Query,  a  misprint?  as  s?>  pictures  are  mentioned. 


48  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1853. 

years :  they  are  as  f  resli  and  lovely  as  when  they  were  first 
enclosed ;  they  need  no  cleaning,  and  will  need  none  for  half  a 
century  to  come ;  and  it  must  be,  therefore,  that  the  rest  of  the 
pictures  are  left  exposed  to  the  London  atmosphere,  and  to  the 
operations  which  its  influence  renders  necessary,  simply  because 
they  are  not  thought  worth  a  -pane  of  plate  glass.  No :  there 
is  yet  one  other  possible  answer — that  many  of  them  are  hung 
so  high,  or  in  such  lights,  that  they  could  not  be  seen  if  they 
were  glazed.  Is  it  then  absolutely  necessary  that  they  should 
be  hung  so  high  ?  AYe  are  about  to  build  a  new  National  Gal- 
lery ;  may  it  not  be  so  arranged  as  that  the  pictures  we  place 
therein  may  at  once  be  safe  and  visible  ? 

I  know  that  this  has  never  yet  been  done  in  any  gallery  "in 
Europe,  for  the  European  public  have  never  yet  reflected  that 
a  picture  which  was  worth  buying  was  also  worth  seeing..  Some 
time  or  other  they  will  assuredly  awake  to  the  perception  of 
this  wonderful  truth,  and  it  would  be  some  credit  to  our 
English  connnon-sense  if  we  were  the  first  to  act  upon  it. 

I  say  that  a  picture  which  is  worth  buying  is  also  worth 
seeing ;  that  is,  worth  so  much  room  of  ground  and  wall  as 
shall  enable  us  to  see  it  to  the  best  advantage.  It  is  not 
commonly  so  understood.  Nations,  like  individuals,  buy  their 
])ictures  in  mere  ostentation ;  and  are  content,  so  that  their 
^possessions  are  acknowledged,  that  they  should  be  lumg  in  any 
dark  or  out-of-the-way  corners  which  their  frames  will  fit.  Or, 
at  best,  the  popular  idea  of  a  national  gallery  is  that  of  a  mag- 
'nificent  palace,  whose  Avails  must  be  decorated  with  colored 
panels,  every  one  of  which  shall  cost  £1,000,  and  be  discernible, 
thi'ough  a  telescope,  for  the  work  of  a  mighty  hand. 

I  have  no  doubt  that  in  a  few  years  more  there  will  be  a 
change  of  feeling  in  this  matter,  and  that  men  will  begin  to 
perceive,  what  is  indeed  the  truth — that  every  noble  picture  is 
a  manuscript  book,  of  which  only  one  copy  exists,  or  ever  can 
exist ;  that  a  national  gallery  is  a  great  library,"^"  of  which  the 

*  "  The  Art  of  a  nation  is,  I  think,  one  of  the  most  important  points  of 
its  histor}',  and  a  part  Avhich,  if  once  destro3'ed.  no  history  will  ever  supply 
the  place  of;  and  the  first,  idea  of  a  National  Gallery  is  that  it  should  be  a 


1852.]  THE    XATIOXAL    GALLERY.  49 

books  must  be  read  upon  their  shelves ;  that  every  manuscript 
ought,  therefore,  to  be  phiced  where  it  cau  be  read  most  easily  ; 
and  that  the  style  of  the  architecture  and  the  effect  of  the 
saloons  are  matters  of  no  importance  whatsoever,  but  that  our 
solicitude  ought  to  begin  and  end  in  the  two  imperative 
recpiirements — that  every  picture  in  the  gallery  should  be  per- 
fectly seen  and  perfectly  safe ;  that  none  should  be  thrust  up, 
or  down,  or  aside,  to  make  room  for  more  important  ones  ; 
that  all  should  be  in  a  good  light,  all  on  a  level  with  the  eye, 
and  all  secure  from  damp,  cold,  impurity  of  atmosphere,  and 
every  other  avoidable  cause  of  deterioration. 

These  are  the  things  to  be  accomplished ;  and  if  we  set 
ourselves  to  do  these  in  our  new"  Xational  Gallery,^'  we  shall 
have  made  a  greater  step  in  art-teaching  than  if  we  had  built  a 
new  Parthenon.  1  know  that  it  will  be  a  strange  idea 
to  most  of  us  that  Titians  and  Tintorets  ought,  indeed,  all  to 
have  places  upon  "  the  line,"  as  well  as  the  annual  productions 
of  our  Royal  Academicians  ;  and  I  know  that  the  coup  d\iil  of 
the  Gallery  must  be  entirely  destroyed  by  such  an  arrangement. 
But  great  pictures  ought  not  to  be  subjects  of  '^  coup^  (Twliy 
In  the  last  arrangement  of  the  Louvre,  under  the  Eepublic,  all 
the  noble  pictures  in  the  gallery  were  brought  into  one  room, 
with  a  Xajjoleon-like  resolution  to  produce  effect  by  concen- 
tration of  force  ;  and,  indeed,  I  w^ould  not  part  willingly  with 
the  memory  of  that  saloon,  whose  obscurest  shadows  were  full 
of  Correggio ;  in  whose  out-of-the-way  angles  one  forgot,  here 
and  there,  a  Raphael ;  and  in  which  the  best  Tintoret  on  this 
side  of  the  Alps  w^as  hung  sixty  feet  from  the  ground  !  f     But 

Library  of  Art,  in  which  the  rudest  efforts  are,  in  some  cases,  hardly  less 
important  than  the  noblest." — National  Gallery  Commission,  1857:  Mr. 
Ruskin's  evidence. 

*  It  was.at  this  time  proposed  to  remove  the  national  pictures  from  Tra- 
falgar Square  to  some  new  buildiug  to  be  erected  for  them  elsewhere.  This 
proposal  was,  however,  negatived  by  the  commission  ultimately  appointed 
(1857)  to  consider  the  matter,  and  to  some  extent  rendered  unnecessary  by 
the  enlargement  of  the  gallery,  decided  upon  in  1866. 

•j-The  galleries  of  the  Louvic  wore  reorganized  on  their  being  declared 
national  instead  of  crown  property,  after  the  Revolution  of  1848;  and  the 


50  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1852. 

Cleopatra  dissolving  the  pearl  was  nothing  to  this  ;  and  I  trust 
that,  in  our  own  Gallery,  our  poverty,  if  not  our  will,  may 
consent  to  a  more  modest  and  less  lavish  manner  of  displaying 
such  treasures  as  are  intrusted  to  us ;  and  that  the  very  limita- 
tion of  our  possessions  may  induce  us  to  make  that  the  object 
of  our  care  which  can  hardly  be  a  ground  of  ostentation.  It 
might,  indeed,  be  a  matter  of  some  difficulty  to  conceive  an 
arrano-ement  of  the  collections  in  the  Louvre  or  the  Florence 
Gallery  which  should  admit  of  every  picture  being  hung  upon 
the  line.  But  the  works  in  our  own,  including  tlie  Vernon  and 
Turner  bequests,*  present  no  obstacle  in  their  number  to  our 
making  the  building  which  shall  receive  them  a  perfect  model 
of  what  a  National  Gallery  ought  to  be.  And  the  conditions 
of  this  perfection  are  so  simple  that  if  we  only  turn  our  atten- 
tion to  these  main  points  it  will  need  no  great  architectural 
ingenuity  to  attain  all  that  is  recpiired. 

It  is  evident,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  building  ought  to 
consist  of  a  series  of  chambers  or  galleries  lighted  from  above, 
and  built  with  such  reference  to  the  pictures  they  are  to  con- 
tain, as  that  opposite  a  large  jHcture  room  enough  should  be 
allowed  for  the  spectator  to  retire  to  the  utmost  distance  at 
which  it  can  ever  be  desirable  that  its  effect  should  be  seen ; 
but,  as  economy  of  space  would  become  a  most  important  object 
when  every  picture  was  to  be  hung  on  a  level  with  the  eye, 
smaller  apartments  might  open  from  the  larger  ones  for  the 
reception  of  smaller  pictures,  one  condition  being,  however, 
made  imperative,  whatever  space  was  sacrificed  to  it — namely, 
that  the  works  of  every  master  should  be  collected  together, 
either  in  the  same  apartment  or  in  contiguous  ones.  Nothing 
has  so  nmch  retarded  the  advance  of  art  as  our  miserable  habit 

clioicest  pictures  were  then  collected  together  in  the  "  grand  salon  carre," 
-which,  although  since  rearranged,  still  contains  a  similar  selection.  The 
"best  Tintoret  on  this  side  of  the  Alps"  is  the  "  Susannah  and  the  Llders," 
now  No.  349  in  that  room. 

*  The  (jift  of  Mr.  Robert  Vernon,  in  1847,  consisted  of  157  pictures,  all 
of  them,  with  two  exceptions  only,  of  the  British  school.  The  Turner 
bequest  included  105  finished  oil  paintings,  in  addition  to  the  numerous 
sketches  and  drawings. 


1852.]  THE    NATIONAL    GALLKKY.  51 

of  mixing  the  works  of  every  master  and  of  every  centnrv. 
More  would  be  leiiriied  by  an  ordinarily  intelligent  observer  in 
simply  passing  from  ii  room  in  whicli  there  were  only  Titians, 
to  another  in  which  there  were  only  Caraccis,  than  by  readini,^ 
a  volume  of  lectures  on  color.  Few  minds  are  strong  enough 
first  to  abstract  and  then  to  generalize  the  characters  of  paint- 
ings hung  at  random.  Few  minds  are  so  dull  as  not  at  once  ti) 
perceive  the  points  of  difference,  were  the  works  of  each  painter 
set  by  themselves.  The  fatigue  of  which  most  persons  com- 
plain in  passing  through  a  picture  gallery,  as  at  present  arranged, 
is  indeed  partly  caused  by  the  straining  effort  to  see  what  is 
out  of  sight,  but  not  less  by  the  continual  change  of  temper 
and  of  tone  of  thought,  demanded  in  passing  from  the  work  of 
one  master  to  that  of  another. 

The  works  of  eacli  being,  therefore,  set  by  themselves,"  and 
the  whole  collection  arrano-ed  in  chronoloijical  andethnoloirical 

o  o  o 

order,  let  apartments  be  designed  for  each  group  large  enough 
to  admit  of  the  increase  of  the  existing  collection  to  any  proba- 
ble amount.  The  whole  gallery  would  thus  become  of  great 
length,  but  might  be  adapted  to  any  form  of  ground-plan  by 
disj^osing  the  whole  in  a  labyrinthine  chain,  returning  upon 
itself.  Its  chronological  arrangement  would  necessitate  its 
being  continuous,  rather  than  divided  into  many  branches  or 
sections.  Being  lighted  from  above,  it  must  be  all  on  the  same 
floor,  but  ought  at  least  to  be  raised  one  story  above  the  ground, 
and  might  admit  any  number  of  keepers'  apartments,  or  of 
schools,  beneath ;  though  it  would  be  better  to  make  it  quite 
independent  of  these,  in  order  to  diminish  the  risk  of  Are.  Its 
walls  ought  on  every  side  to  be  surrounded  by  coi-ridors,  so  that 
the  interior  temperature  might  be  kept  equal,  and  no  outer 
surface  of  wall  on  whicli  pictures  were  hung  exjiosed  to  the 
weather.     Every  picture   should  be  glazed,  and  the  horizon 

*An  example  of  a  cognate  school  might,  however,  be  occa- 
sionally introduced  for  the  sake  of  direct  comparison,  as  in  one 
instance  would  be  necessitated  by  the  condition  above  mentioned 
attached  to  part  of  tlic  Turner  bequest. 


52  LETTERS    Ois-    ART.  [1866. 

wliicli  the  painter  had  given  to  it  placed  on  a  level  with  the 
eye. 

Lastly,  opposite  each  picture  should  be  a  table,  containing, 
under  glass,  every  engraving  that  had  ever  been  made  from  it, 
and  any  studies  for  it,  by  the  master's  own  hand,  that  remained, 
or  were  obtainable.  The  values  of  the  study  and  of  the  picture 
are  reciprocally  increased — of  the  former  more  than  doubled — 
by  their  being  seen  together ;  and  if  this  system  were  once 
adopted,  the  keepers  of  the  various  galleries  of  Europe  would 
doubtless  consent  to  such  exchanges  of  the  sketches  in  their 
possession  as  would  render  all  their  collections  more  interesting. 

I  trust.  Sir,  that  the  importance  of  this  subject  will  excuse 
the  extent  of  my  trespass  upon  your  columns,  and  that  the 
simplicity  and  self-evident  desirableness  of  the  arrangement  I 
have  described  may  vindicate  my  proposal  of  it  from  the  charge 
of  presumption. 

I  have  the  honor  to  be.  Sir, 

Your  obedient  servant. 
The  Author  of  "  Modern  Painters." 
Herne  Hill,  Dulwich,  Dec.  27. 


[From  •'  The  Times,"  January  27,  1866.] 

THE  BRITISH  MUSEUM. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times." 

Sir  :  As  I  see  in  your  impression  of  yesterday  that  my  name 
was  introduced  in  support  of  some  remarks  made,  at  the  meet- 
ing of  the  Society  of  Arts,  on  the  management  of  the  British 
Museum,"^"  and  as  the  tendency  of  the  remarks  I  refer  to  was 

*  At  the  meeting  of  the  Society,  in  the  Hall,  Adelphi,  Lord  Henry 
Lennox  read  u  paper  on  "  The  Uses  of  National  Museums  to  Local  Insti- 
tutions," in  which  he  spoke  of  Mr.  Ruskin's  suggestions  "adopted  and 
recommended  to  Parliament  in  annual  reports,  and  in  obedience  to  distinct 
Commissions,"  as  having  been  unwarrantably  disregarded  since  1858.  See 
Mr.  Ruskin's  official  report  on  the  Turner  Bequest,  printed  in  the  "  Report 
of  the  Director  of  the  National  Gallery  to  the  Lords  of  the  Treasury,  1858," 
Appendix  vii. 


1866.]  THE    BRITISH   MUSEUM.  53 

depreciatory  of  the  efforts  and  aims  of  several  officers  of  the 
Museuin — more  especially  of  tlie  work  done  on  the  collection 
of  minerals  by  my  friend  Mr.  Nevil  S.  Maskelyne* — yon  will, 
I  hope,  permit  me.  not  having  been  present  at  the  meeting,  to 
express  my  feeling  on  the  subject  brielly  in  your  columns. 

There  is  a  confused  notion  in  the  existing  public  mind  tliat 
the  British  Museum  is  partly  a  parish  school,  partly  a  circu- 
lating library,  and  partly  a  place  for  Christmas  entertainments. 

It  is  none  of  the  three,  and,  I  hope,  will  never  be  made 
any  of  the  three.  But  especially  and  most  distinctly  it  is  not 
a  *'  preparatory  school,"  nor  even  an  ''  academy  for  young 
gentlemen,"  nor  even  a  "  working-men's  college."  A  national 
museum  is  one  thing,  a  national  place  of  education  another; 
and  the  more  sternl}^  and  unequivocally  they  are  separated, 
the  better  will  each  perform  its  office — the  one  of  treasuring 
and  the  other  of  teaching.  I  heartily  wish  that  there  were 
already,  as  one  day  there  must  be,  lai-ge  educational  museums 
in  every  district  of  London,  freely  open  every  day,  and  well 
lighted  and  warmed  at  night,  with  all  furniture  of  comfort, 
and  full  aids  for  tlie  use  of  their  contents  by  all  classes.  But 
you  might  just  as  rationally  send  the  British  public  to  the 
Tower  to  study  mineralogy  upon  the  Crown  jewels  as  make 
the  unique  pieces  of  a  worthy  national  collection  (such  as, 
owing  mainly  to  the  exertions  of  its  maligned  officers,  that  of 
our  British  Museum  has  recently  become)  the  means  of  ele- 
mentary public  instruction.  After  men  have  learnt  their 
science  or  their  art,  at  least  so  far  as  to  know  a  common  and 
a  rare  example  in  either,  a  national  museum  is  useful,  and 
ought  to  be  easily  accessible  to  them;  but  until  then,  unique 
or  selected  specimens  in  natural  history  are  without  interest 
to  t^em,  and  the  best  art  is  as  useless  as  a  blank  wall.  For  all 
those  who  can  use  the  existing  national  collection  to  any  pur- 
pose, the  Catalogue  as  it  now  stands  is  amply  sufficient :  it 
would  be  difficult  to  conceive  a  more  serviceable  one.  But 
the   rapidly   progressive    state    of    (especially   mineralogicali 

*  Professor  Nevil  Story -Maskelyne  (now  M.P.  for  Cricklade)  was  then, 
and  till  his  recent  resignation,  Keeper  of  Mineralogy  at  the  Museum. 


54  LETTERS   01^   ART.  [1866. 

science,  renders  it  impossible  for  the  Curators  to  make  their 
arrangements  in  all  points  satisfactory,  or  for  long  periods 
permanent.  It  is  just  because  Mr.  Maskelyne  is  doing  more 
active,  continual,  and  careful  work  than,  as  far  as  I  know,  is 
at  present  done  in  any  national  museum  in  Europe — because 
he  is  completing  gaps  in  the  present  series  by  the  intercala- 
tion of  carefully  sought  specimens,  and  accurately  reforming 
its  classification  by  recently  corrected  analyses — that  the  col- 
lection cannot  yet  fall  into  the  formal  and  placid  order  in 
which  an  indolent  Curator  would  speedily  arrange  and  will- 
ingly leave  it. 

I  am  glad  that  Lord  H.  Lennox  referred  to  the  passage  in 
my  report  on  the  Turner  Collection  in  which  I  recommended 
that  cei'tain  portions  of  that  great  series  should  be  distributed, 
for  permanence,  among  our  leading  provincial  towns.*  But 
I  had  rather  see  the  whole  Turner  Collection  buried,  not 
merely  in  the  cellars  of  the  National  Gallery,  but  with 
Prosperous  staff  fathoms  in  the  earth,  than  that  it  should 
be  the  means  of  inaugurating  the  fatal  custom  of  carrying 
great  works  of  art  al)Out  the  roads  for  a  show.  If  you  mtist 
make  them  educational  to  the  public,  hang  Titian's  Bacchus 
up  for  a  vintners  sign,  and  give  Henry  YI.'s  Psalter f  for  a 

*In  ]Mr.  Ruskin's  official  report  already  mentioned,  and  Avhicli  was  made 
at  the  close  of  his  labors  in  arranging  the  Turner  drav.'ings,  and  dated 
March  27,  1858,  he  divided  the  collection  into  three  classes,  of  which  the 
third  consisted  of  drawings  available  for  distribution  among  provincial 
Schools  of  Art.  The  passage  of  the  report  referred  to  is  as  follows:  "  The 
remainder  of  the  collection  consists  of  drawings  of  miscellaneous  character, 
from  which  many  might  be  spared  with  little  loss  to  the  collection  in  Lon- 
don, and  great  advantage  to  students  in  the  provinces.  Five  or  six  collec- 
tions, each  completely  illustrative  of  Turner's  modes  of  study,  and  succes- 
sions of  practice,  might  easily  be  prepared  for  the  academies  of  Edinburgh, 
Dublin,  and  the  principal  English  manufacturing  towns." — See  also  the 
similar  recommendation  with  regard  to  the  "Outlines  of  John  Leech,"  in 
the  letter  on  that  subject. 

f  Titian's  "Bacchus  and  Ariadne"— already  mentioned,  p.  40.  Henry 
VL's  Psalter  is  in  the  British  Museum  ("  Domitian  A.  17,"  in  the  Cottonian 
Catalogue).  It  is  of  early  tifteenth  century  work,  and  was  executed  in 
England  by  a  French  artist  for  the  then  youthful  king,  from  whom  it  takes 
its  name. 


1880.]  ON   THE    PURCHASE   OF    PICTURES.  55 

spelling-book  to  the  Bliiecoat  School ;  but,  at  least,  hang  the 
one  from  a  permanent  post,  and  chain  the  other  to  the  bovs' 
desks,  and  do  not  send  them  about  in  caravans  to  every  auuual 
Bartholomew  Fair. 

I  am.  Sir,  your  obedieiii  >L-r\aJit, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hlll.  Jan.  26. 


[From  "The  Leicester  Chronicle  and  Mercury,"  January  31,  and  reprinted  in  "The 
Times,"  February  2,  1880.] 


ON  THE  PURCHASE  OF  PICTURES* 

Dear  Sir  :  Your  letter  is  deeply  interesting  to  me,  but 
what  use  is  there  in  my  telling  you  what  to  do  i  The  mob 
won't  let  you  do  it.  It  is  fatally  true  that  no  one  nowadays 
can  appreciate  pictures  by  the  Old  Masters!  and  that  every 
one  can  understand  Frith's  "  Derby  Day" — that  is  to  say, 
everybody  is  interested  in  jockeys,  harlots,  mountebanks,  and 
men  about  town ;  but  nobody  in  saints,  heroes,  kings,  or  wise 
men — either  from  the  east  or  west.  What  can  you  do  ?  If 
your  Committee  is  strong  enough  to  carry  such  a  resolution  as 
the  appointment  of  any  singly  responsible  person,  any  well- 
informed  gentleman  of  taste  in  your  neighborhood,  to  buy  for 
the  Leicester  public  just  what  he  would  buy  for  himself — that 
is  to  say,  himself  and  his  family — children  being  the  really 
most  important  of  the  untaught  ])ublic — and  to  answer  simply 
to  all  accusation — that  is,  a  good  and  worthy  piece  of  art 
(past  or  present,  no  matter  which) — make  the  most  and  best 
you  can  of  it.  That  method  so  long  as  tenable  will  be  useful. 
1  know  of  no  other. 

Faithfully  yours,  J.  ItusKix. 

*  This  letter  was  written  in  reply  to  one  requestin«T  Mr.  Ruskin's  views 
on  the  best  means  of  formiuL^  :i  imhlic  Gallery  at  Leicester. 


LETTERS   ON  ART. 


TIL 
PRE-RAPHAELITISM. 

The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren.     1851  (May  9). 
The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren.     1851   ("May  '26). 
"The  Light  of  the  World,"   Holman  Hunt.     1854. 
"The  Awakening  Conscience,"  Holman  Hunt.     1854. 
Pre-Raphaelitism  in  Liverpool.     1858. 
Generalization  and  the  Scotch  Pre-Kapuaelites.     1858 


y^        CK    Till!  '^^ 

NIVERSITY 


III. 

PEE-EAPHAELITISM. 

[From  •'  The  Times,"  May  13,  1851.] 

TIIE  PRE-RAPHAELITE  BRETUREN. 

To  the  Editor  of  ''Tlie  Times:' 

Sir  :  Your  usual  liberality  will,  I  trust,  give  a  place  in 
your  columns  to  this  expression  of  my  regret  that  the  tone  of 
the  critique  which  appeared  in  The  Times  of  Wednesday  last 
on  the  works  of  Mr.  Millais  and  Mr.  Hunt,  now  in  the  Itoyal 
Academy,  should  have  been  scornful  as  well  as  severe.* 

I  regret  it,  first,  because  the  mere  labor  bestowed  on  those 
works,  and  their  fidelity  to  a  certain  order  of  truth  (labor  and 
fidelity  which  are  altogether  indisputable),  ought  at  once  to 
have  placed  them  above  the  level  of  mere  contempt;  and, 
secondly,  because  I  believe  these  young  artists  to  be  at  a  most 
critical  period  of  their  career — at  a  turaing-point,  from  which 
they  may  either  sink  into  nothingness  or  rise  to  very  real 
greatness ;  and  I  believe  also,  that  whether  they  choose  the 
upward  or  the  downward  path,  may  in  no  small  degree  depend 

*  That  the  critique  was  sufRcientlj''  bitter,  may  be  gathered  from  the 
following  portions  of  it:  "  These  young  artists  have  unfortunately  become 
notorious  by  addicting  themselves  to  an  antiquated  style  and  an  affected 
simplicity  in  painting.  .  .  .  We  can  extend  no  toleration  to  a  mere  senile 
imitation  of  the  cramped  style,  false  perspective,  and  crude  color  of  remote 
auti(iuity.  We  want  not  to  see  what  Fuseli  termed  drapery  '  snapped 
instead  of  folded; '  faces  bloated  into  apoplexy,  or  extenuated  to  skeletons; 
color  borrowed  from  the  jars  in  a  druggist's  shop,  and  expression  forced 
into  caricature.  .  .  .  That  morbid  infatuation  which  sacrifices  truth, 
beauty,  and  genuine  fecliiiLr  to  mere  eccentricity,  deserves  no  quarter  at  the 
hands  of  the  pnl-;;'-  " 


60  LETTERS   OK   ART.  [1851. 

upon  the  clmracter  of  the  criticism  which  their  works  have  to 
sustain.  I  do  not  wish  in  any  way  to  dispute  or  invalidate 
the  general  truth  of  your  criticpe  on  the  Royal  Academy ;  nor 
am  I  surprised  at  tlje  estimate  which  the  writer  formed  of  the 
pictures  in  question  when  rapidly  compared  with  works  of 
totally  different  style  and  aim ;  nay,  when  I  first  saw  the  chief 
picture  by  Millais  in  the  Exhibition  of  last  year,*  I  had  nearly 
come  to  the  same  conclusion  myself.  But  I  ask  your  per- 
mission, in  justice  to  artists  who  have  at  least  given  much 
time  and  toil  to  their  pictures,  to  institute  some  more  serious 
inquiry  into  their  merits  and  faults  than  your  general  notice 
of  the  Academy  could  possibly  have  admitted. 

Let  me  state,  in  the  first  place,  that  I  have  no  acquaint- 
ance with  any  of  these  artists,  and  very  imperfect  sympathy 
with  them.  Iso  one  who  has  met  with  any  of  my  writings 
will  suspect  me  of  desiring  to  encourage  them  in  their  Roman- 
ist and  Tractarian  tendencies.f  I  am  glad  to  see  that  Mr. 
Millais'  lady  in  blue  if  is  heartily  tired  of  her  painted  windoAv 

*  A  sacred  picture  (No.  518)  upon  the  text,  "And  one  shall  say  unto 
him,  What  are  these  wounds  in  tliine  hands?  Then  he  shall  answer, 
Those  with  which  I  was  wounded  in  the  house  of  my  friends"  (Zechariah 
xiii.  6).  He  had  two  other  pictures  in  the  xlcademy  of  1850,  namely, 
"Portrait  of  a  gentleman  and  his  grandchild"  (No.  439),  and  "  Ferdinand 
lured  by  Ariel  "  (No.  504)— Shakespeare,  "  Tempest,"  Act  ii.  sc.  2. 

f  See  the  next  letter,  p.  96.  With  regard  to  the  religious  tone  of  some 
parts  of  Mr.  Ruskin's  early  writings,  it  is  worth  noting  that  in  the  recent 
reissue  (1880)  of  the  "Seven  Lamps  of  Architecture,"  "some  pieces  of 
rabid  and  utterly  false  Protestantism  .  .  .  are  cut  from  text  and  appendix 
alike." — (Preface,  p.  1;  and  see  the  note  on  one  such  omission  on  p.  19.) 
So  again  in  the  preface  to  the  final  edition  of  "  Modern  Painters,"  issued  in 
1873,  Mr.  Ruskin  stated  that  his  objection  to  republishing  unrevised  the  first 
two  volumes  of  that  work  was  that  "  they  are  written  in  a  narrow  enthusi- 
asm, and  the  substance  of  their  metaphysical  and  religious  speculation  is 
only  justifiable  on  the  ground  of  its  absolute  sincerity."— See  also  "Sesame 
and  Lilies,"  1871  ed.,  Preface,  p.  2. 

X  The  pre-Raphaelite  pictures  exhibited  in  the  Academy  of  this  year, 
and  referred  to  here  and  in  the  following  letter,  were  the  "Mariana" 
(No.  561)  of  Millais,  "  The  Return  of  the  Dove  to  the  Ark"  (No.  651),  and 
"  The  Woodman's  Daughter"  (No.  799),  (see  Coventry  Patmore's  Poems, 
vol.  i.  p.  184—4  vol.  ed.,  1879),  both  also  by  Millais;  the  "Valentine 
receiving  (rescuing?)  Sylvia  from  Proteus"  (No.  594),  of    llolman  Hunt; 


1851.]  THE    PKE-ilAPIIAKTJTE    BRETIIllKX.  6l 

and  idolatrous  toilut  table ;  and  I  have  no  particular  respect 
for  Mr.  Collins'  lady  in  white,  because  her  sympathies  are 
limited  by  a  dead  wall,  or  divided  between  some  gold  lish  and 
a  tadpole — (the  latter  Mr.  Collins  may,  })i.'rhaps,  permit  me  to 
sugp:cst  en  passant,  as  he  is  already  half  a  frog,  is  rather  too 
small  for  his  age).  But  I  happen  to  have  a  special  acMpiaint- 
anee  Avith  the  water  plant,  Alisnia  Pla)ita(j<)^  among  wliich 
the  said  gold  fish  are  swimming ;  and  as  I  never  saw  it  so 
thoroughly  or  so  well  drawn,  1  must  take  leave  to  remonstrate 
with  you,  when  ycju  say  sweepingly  that  these  men  "sacrifice 
trutli  as  well  as  feelinc^  to  eccentricitv."  For  as  a  mere 
l)otanical  study  of  the  water-lily  and  Alisma,  as  well  as  of  the 
common  lily  and  several  other  garden  flowers,  this  picture 
would  be  invaluable  to  me,  and  I  heartily  wish  it  were  mine. 

But,  before  entering  into  such  particulars,  let  me  coi*rect 
an  impression  which  your  article  is  likely  to  induce  in  most 
minds,  and  which  is  altogether  false.  These  pre-llaphaelites 
(I  caimot  compliment  them  on  common-sense  in  choice  of  a 
nam  de  guerre)  do  not  desire  nor  pretend  in  any  way  to  imitate 
antique  painting  as  such.  They  know  very  little  of  ancient 
paintings  who  suppose  the  works  of  these  young  artists  to 
i-e^^emble  them."    As  far  as  I  can  judge  of  their  aim — for,  as  I 

and  the  "Convent  Thoughts"  (Xo.  493)  of  ]\[r.  C.  Collins,  to  which  were 
tiffixed  the  lines  from  ' '  Midsummer  Night's  Dream"  (Act  i.  sc.  1), 

*'  Thrice  blessed  they,  that  master  so  their  blood 
To  undergo  such  maiden  pilgrimage;" 

and  the  verse  (Psalm  cxliii.  o),  "I  meditate  on  all  Thy  works;  I  muse 
on  the  work  of  Thy  hands."  The  last-named  artist  also  had  a  portrait  of 
]Mr.  AVilliam  Bennett  (Xo.  718)  in  the  Exhibition — not,  however,  alluded  to 
in  this  letter.  Mr.  Charles  Allston  Collins,  who  was  the  son  of  William 
Collins,  K.A.,  and  the  younger  brother  of  Mr.  Wilkie  Collins,  subsctiuently 
turned  his  attention  to  literature,  and  may  l)e  remembered  as  the  author  of 
•'  A  Cruise  upon  Wheels,"  "  The  Eye- Witness,"  and  other  writings. 

*  Compare  "Modern  Painters,"  vol.  i.  p.  415,  note,  where  allusion  is 
made  to  the  painters  of  a  society  which  "unfortunately,  or  rather  un- 
wisely, has  given  it.self  the  name  of  'Pre-Raphaelite;'  unfortunately, 
because  the  principles  on  which  its  members  are  working  are  neither  pn-- 
nor  post-Raphaelite,  but  everlasting.     They  are  endeavoring  to  paint  wiili 


62  LETTEES   OK   ART.  [1851. 

said,  I  do  not  know  the  men  themselves — the  pre-Raphaelites 
intend  to  surrender  no  advantage  which  the  knowledge  or 
inventions  of  the  present  time  can  afford  to  their  art.  They 
intend  to  return  to  early  days  in  this  one  point  only — that, 
as  far  as  in  them  lies,  they  will  draw  either  what  they  see,  or 
what  they  suppose  might  have  been  the  actual  facts  of  the 
scene  they  desire  to  represent,  irrespective  of  any  conven- 
tional rules  of  picture-making;  and  they  have  chosen  their 
unfortunate  though  not  inaccurate  name  because  all  artists 
did  this  before  KaphaeFs  time,  and  after  EaphaePs  time  did 
not  this,  but  sought  to  paint  fair  pictures,  rather  than  rej^re- 
sent  stern  facts ;  of  which  the  consequence  has  been  that, 
from  Raphael's  time  to  this  day,  historical  art  has  been  in 
acknowledged  decadence. 

IS^ow,  sir,  presupposing  that  the  intention  of  these  men 
was  to  return  to  archaic  art  instead  of  to  archaic  honesty^ 
your  critic  borrows  Fuseli's  expression  respecting-  ancient 
draperies  "snaj^ped  instead  of  folded,"  and  asserts  that  in 
these  pictures  there  is  a  '' servile  imitation  oi  false  perspec- 
tive.''    To  w^hich  I  have  just  this  to  answer  : 

That  there  is  not  one  single  error  in  perspective  in  four 
out  of  the  five  23ictures  in  question  ;  and  that  in  Millais' 
"Mariana"  there  is  but  this  one — that  the  top  of  the  green 
curtain  in  the  distant  window  has  too  low  a  vanishing-jDoint ; 
and  that  I  ^dll  undertake,  if  need  be,  to  point  out  and  prove 
a  dozen  worse  erroi's  in  perspective  in  any  twelve  pictures, 
containing  architecture,  taken  at  random  from  among  the 
works  of  the  popular  painters  of  the  day. 

Secondly :  that,  putting  aside  the  small  Mulready,  and  the 
works  of  Thorburn  and  Sir  W.  Eoss,  and  perhaps  some  others 
of  those  in  the  miniature  room  which  I  have  not  examined, 
tliere  is  not  a  single  study  of  drapery  in  the  whole  Academy, 
1)0  it  in  large  works  or  small,  which  for  perfect  truth,  power, 
and  finish  could  be  compared  for  an  instant  with  the  black 

the  highest  possible  degree  of  completion,  what  they  see  in  nature,  without 
reference  to  conventional  established  rules;  but  by  no  means  to  imitate  the 
style  of  any  past  epoch." 


1851.]  THE    PRE-RAPIIAELITE   BRETHREN.  63 

sleeve  of  the  Julia,  or  with  the  velvet  on  the  breast  and  the 
chain  mail  of  the  Valentine,  of  Mr.  Hunt's  picture ;  or  with 
the  white  draperies  on  the  table  of  Mr.  Millais'  ''  Mariana," 
and  of  the  right-hand  figure  in  the  same  painter's  "  Dove 
j-eturninii;  to  the  Ark." 

And  further :  that  as  studies  both  of  drapery  and  of  every 
minor  detail,  there  has  been  nothing  in  art  so  earnest  or  so 
complete  as  these  pictures  since  the  days  of  Albert  Durer. 
This  I  assert  generally  and  fearlessly.  On  the  other  hand,  I 
am  perfectly  ready  to  admit  that  Mr.  Hunt's  "  Sylvia"  is  nut 
a  person  whom  Proteus  or  any  one  else  would  have  been  likely 
to  fall  in  love  with  at  lirst  sight ;  and  that  one  cannot  feel  very 
sincere  delight  that  Mr.  Millais'  ''Wives  of  the  Sons  of  Noah" 
should  have  escaped  the  Deluge ;  with  many  other  faults 
besides,  on  which  I  will  not  enlarge  at  present,  because  I  have 
already  occupied  too  much  of  your  valuable  space,  and  I  hope 
to  enter  into  more  special  criticism  in  a  future  letter. 
I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir, 

Your  obedient  servant. 
The  AmnoR  of  "Modern  Painters.*' 
Dexmark  Hill,  May  9. 


L 


LFrom  "The  Times,"  May  30,  1851.] 
THE  PRE-RAPHAELITE  BRETHREN. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times:' 

Sir  :  Your  obliging  insertion  of  my  former  letter  encour- 
ages me  to  trouble  you  with  one  or  two  further  notes  respect- 
ing the  pre-Raphaelite  pictures.  I  had  intended,  in  continuation 
of  my  first  letter,  to  institute  as  close  an  inquiry  as  I  could  into 
the  character  of  the  morbid  tendencies  which  prevent  these 
works  from  favorably  arresting  the  attention  of  the  pu])lic  \  but 
I  believe  there  are  so  few  pictures  in  the   Academy  whose 


64  LETTERS   OK   ART.  [1851. 

reputation  would  not  be  grievously  diminished  by  a  deliberate 
inventory  of  their  errors,  that  I  am  disinclined  to  undertake 
so  ungracious  a  task  with  respect  to  this  or  -that  particular 
work.  These  jDoints,  however,  may  be  noted,  partly  for  the 
consideration  of  the  painters  themselves,  partly  that  forgive- 
ness of  them  may  be  asked  from  the  public  in  consideration  of 
high  merits  in  other  resj^ects. 

The  most  painful  of  these  defects  is  unhappily  also  the 
most  prominent — the  commonness  of  feature  in  many  of  the 
principal  ligures.  In  Mr.  Hunt's  "  Yalentine  defending  Syl- 
via," this  is,  indeed,  almost  the  only  fault.  Further  examina- 
tion of  this  picture  has  even  raised  the  estimate  I  had  pre- 
viously formed  of  its  marvellous  truth  in  detail  and  splendor 
in  color ;  nor  is  its  general  conception  less  deserving  of  praise : 
the  action  of  Yalentine,  his  arm  thrown  round  Sylvia,  and  his 
hand  clasping  hers  at  the  same  instant  as  she  falls  at  his  feet, 
is  most  faithful  and  beautiful,  nor  less  so  the  contending  of 
doubt  and  distress  with  awakening  hope  in  the  half-shadowed, 
half -sunlit  countenance  of  Julia.  I^ay,  even  the  momentary 
struggle  of  Proteus  with  Sylvia  just  past,  is  indicated  by  the 
trodden  grass  and  broken  fungi  of  the  foreground.  But  all 
this  thoughtful  conception,  and  absolutely  inimitable  execu- 
tion, fail  in  making  immediate  appeal  to  the  feelings,  owing  to 
the  unfortunate  type  chosen  for  the  face  of  Sylvia.  Certainly 
this  cannot  be  she  whose  lover  was 

'  As  rich  in  having  such  a  jewel, 
As  twenty  seas,  if  all  their  sands  were  pearl."* 

[N'or  is  it,  perhaps,  less  to  be  regretted  that,  while  in  Shak- 
speare's  play  there  are  nominally  ''  Two  Gentlemen,"  in  Mr. 
Hunt's  picture  there  should  only  be  one — at  least,  the  kneeling 
figure  on  the  right  has  by  no  means  the  look  of  a  gentleman. 
But  this  may  be  on  purpose,  for  any  one  who  remembers  the 
conduct  of  Proteus  throughout  the  previous  scenes  will,  I  think, 

*  "Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  Act  ii.  sc.  4.    The  scene  of  the  picture 
was  taken  from  Act  v.  sc.  4. 


1851.]  THE    PRE-RAPHAELITE    BRETHREN.  65 

be  disposed  to  consider  tliiit  the  error  lies  more  in  Shakspeare's 
nomenclature  than  in  Mr,  Hunt's  ideal. 

No  defence  can,  however,  be  offered  for  the  choice  of  feat- 
ures in  the  left-hand  tii!;ure  of  Mr.  Millais'  '*  Dove  returniuir 
to  the  Ark."  I  cannot  understand  how  a  ])ainter  so  sensible 
of  the  utmost  refinement  of  beauty  in  other  objects  should 
deliberately  choose  for  his  model  a  type  far  inferior  to  that  of 
average  humanity,  and  unredeemed  by  any  expression  save 
that  of  dull  self-complacency.  Yet,  let  the  spectator  who 
desires  to  be  just  turn  away  from  this  head,  and  contemplate 
rather  the  tender  and  beautiful  expression  of  the  stooping 
figure,  and  the  intense  harmony  of  color  in  the  exquisitely  fin- 
ished draperies;  let  him  note  also  the  ruffling  of  the  phnnage 
of  the  wearied  dove,  one  of  its  feathers  falling  on  the  arm  of 
the  figure  which  holds  it,  and  another  to  the  ground,  where, 
by  the  bye,  the  hay  is  painted  not  only  elaborately,  but  with  the 
most  perfect  ease  of  touch  and  mastery  of  effect,  especially  to 
be  observed  because  this  freedom  of  execution  is  a  modern 
excellence,  which  it  has  been  inaccurately  stated  that  these 
painters  despise,  but  which,  in  reality,  is  one  of  the  remarkable 
distinctions  between  their  painting  and  that  of  Van  Eyck  or 
Ilemling,  which  caused  me  to  say  in  my  first  letter  that  "  those 
knew  little  of  ancient  painting  who  supposed  the  works  of 
these  men  to  resemble  it." 

Next  to  this  false  choice  of  feature,  and  in  connection  with 
it,  is  to  be  noted  the  defect  in  the  coloi'ing  of  the  flesh.  The 
hands,  at  least  in  the  pictures  in  Millais,  are  almost  always 
ill  painted,  and  the  flesh  tint  in  general  is  wrought  out  of  crude 
purples  and  dusky  yellows.  It  appears  just  possible  that  nnich 
of  this  evil  may  arise  from  the  attempt  to  ol)tain  too  much 
transparency — an  attempt  which  has  injured  also  not  a  few  of 
the  best  w^orks  of  Mulready.  I  believe  it  will  be  generally 
found  that  close  study  of  minor  details  is  unfavorable  to  flesh 
painting;  it  was  noticed  of  the  drawing  by  John  Lewis,  in  the 
old  water-color  exhibition  of  1850  *  (a  work  which,  as  regards 

*  "The  Hhareem"  (Xo.   147),  noticed,  partly  to  tlie  above  cfTcct,  in 
The  Times,  Ma}^  1,  1850.    It  will  be  remembered  that  Johu  Lewis  is,  with 


66  LETTERS   ON    ART.  [1851. 

its  treatment  of  detail,  may  be  ranged  in  the  same  class  with 
the  pre-Raphaelite  pictures),  that  the  faces  were  the  worst 
painted  portions  of  the  whole. 

The  apparent  want  of  shade  is,  however,  perhaps  the  fault 
which  most  hurts  the  general  eye.  The  fact  is,  nevertheless, 
that  the  fault  is  far  more  in  the  other  pictures  of  the  Academy 
than  in  the  pre-Raphaelite  ones.  It  is  the  former  that  are 
false,  not  the  latter,  except  so  far  as  every  picture  must  be 
false  which  endeavors  to  I'^present  living  sunlight  with  dead 
pigments.  I  think  Mr.  Hunt  has  a  slight  tendency  to  exagger- 
ate reflected  lights ;  and  if  Mr.  Millais  has  ever  been  near  a 
piece  of  good  painted  glass,  he  ought  to  have  known  that  its 
tone  is  more  dusky  and  sober  than  that  of  his  Mariana's  win- 
dow. But  for  the  most  part  these  pictures  are  rashly  con- 
demned because  the  only  light  which  we  are  accustomed  to 
see  represented  is  that  which  falls  on  the  artist's  model  in  his 
dim  painting  room,  not  that  of  sunshine  in  the  fields. 

I  do  not  think  I  can  go  much  further  in  fault-finding.  I 
had,  indeed,  something  to  urge  respecting  what  I  supposed  to 
be  the  Romanizing  tendencies  of  the  painters ;  but  I  have 
received  a  letter  assuring  me  that  I  was  wrong  in  attributing 
to  them  anything  of  the  kind ;  whereupon,  all  that  I  can  say 
is  that,  instead  of  the  "pilgrimage"  of  Mr.  Collins'  maiden 
over  a  plank  and  round  a  fish-pond,  that  old  pilgrimage  of 
Christiana  and  her  children  towards  the  place  where  they  should 
"  look  the  Fountain  of  Mercy  in  the  face,"  would  have  been 
more  to  the  purpose  in  these  times.  And  so  I  wish  them 
all  heartily  good-speed,  believing  in  sincerity  that  if  they  tem- 
per the  courage  and  energy  which  they  have  shown  in  the 
adoption  of  their  systems  with  patience  and  discretion  in  fram- 
ing it,  and  if  they  do  not  suffer  themselves  to  be  driven  by 
harsh  or  careless  criticism  into  rejection  of  the  ordinary  means 
of  obtaining  influence  over  the  minds  of  others,  they  may,  as 
they  gain  experience,  lay  in  our  England  the  foundations  of  a 

Turner,  Millais,  Prout,  Mulready,  and  Edwin  Landseer,  one  of  the  artists 
particularly  mentioned  in  Mr.  Ruskin's  pamphlet  on  "  Pre-Raphaelitism" 
(1851),  p.  33;  and  see  also  "Academy  Notes,"  III.,  1857,  p.  48. 


I  I   1854.]  '-THE    LIGHT   OF   THE    WOKLD.''  67 

gchool  of  art  nobler  tlian  the  world  has  seen  for  three  hundred 
St  I  years.* 


I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir, 


Your  obedient  seyvant, 
The  Autuok  of  ''Modekn  Paintees." 
Denmark  Hill,  Mai/  26, 


IFrom  "  The  Times,"  May  5, 1851.] 

THB  LIGHT  OF  THE  WOULD:* 
ByHoLMAN  Hunt. 


To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Tuimr 

Sir  :  I  trust  that,  with  your  usual  kindness  and  liberality, 
you  will  give  me  room  in  your  columns  for  a  few  words  re- 
specting the  principal  prse-Kaphaelite  picture  in  the  Exhibition 
of  the  Royal  Academy  this  year.  Its  painter  is  travelling  in 
the  Holy  Land,  and  can  neither  suffer  nor  benefit  by  criticism. 
But  I  am  solicitous  that  justice  should  be  done  to  his  wurk, 
not  for  his  sake,  but  for  that  of  the  large  number  of  persons 
who,  during  the  year,  will  have  an  opportunity  .of  seeing  it, 
and  on  whom,  if  rightly  understood,  it  may  make  an  impres- 
sion for  which  they  will  ever  afterwards  be  grateful. -f 

I  speak  of  the  picture  called  "  the  Light  of  the  World,"  by 
Mr.  Holman  Hunt.  Standing  by  it  yesterday  for  upwards 
of  an  hour,  I  watched  the  effect  it  produced  u})on  the  passei*s- 

*  "  I  have  great  hope  that  they  may  become  the  foundation  of  a  more 
earnest  and  able  school  of  art  than  we  have  seen  for  centuries." — "  Modern 
Painters,"  vol.  i,  p.  415,  note. 

t  Of  the  two  pictures  described  in  this  and  the  following  letter,  ''The 
Light  of  the  World  "  is  well  known  from  the  engraving  of  it  by  W.  II, 
Simmons.  It  was  originally  purchased  by  Mr.  Thomas  Combe,  of  Oxford, 
whose  widow  has  recently  presented  it  to  Kuble  College,  where  it  now  hangs, 
in  the  library.  The  subject  of  the  second  picture,  whicli  is  less  well  known, 
and  which  has  never  been  engraved,  sufficiently  appears  from  the  letter 
describing  it. 


68  LETTERS  ON   ART.  [1854. 

by.  Few  stopped  to  look  at  it,  and  those  wlio  did  almost 
invariably  with  some  contemptuous  expression,  founded  on 
what  appeared  to  them  the  absurdity  of  representing  the 
Saviour  with  a  lantern  in  his  hand.  Now,  it  ought  to  be 
remembered  that,  whatever  may  be  the  faults  of  a  prse- 
Raphaelite  picture,  it  must  at  least  have  taken  much  time ;  and 
therefore  it  may  not  unwarrantably  be  presumed  that  concep- 
tions which  are  to  be  laboriously  realized  are  not  adopted  in  the 
first  instance  without  some  reflection.  So  that  the  spectator  may 
surely  question  with  himself  whether  the  objections  which  now 
strike  every  one  in  a  moment  might  not  possibly  have  occurred 
to  the  painter  himself,  either  during  the  time  devoted  to  the 
design  of  the  pictui-e,  or  the  months  of  labor  required  for  its 
execution ;  and  whether,  therefore,  there  may  not  be  some 
reason  for  his  persistence  in  such  an  idea,  not  discoverable  at 
the  first  glance. 

Mr.  Hunt  ha9  never  explained  his  work  to  me.  I  give  what 
appears  to  me  its  palpable  interpretation. 

The  legend  beneath  it  is  the  beautiful  verse,  "  Behold,  I 
stand  at  the  door  and  knock.  If  any  man  hear  my  voice,  and 
open  the  door,  I  will  come  in  to  him,  and  will  sup  with  him, 
and  he  with  me." — Rev.  iii.  20.  On  the  left-hand  side  of  the 
picture  is  seen  this  door  of  the  human  soul.  It  is  fast  barred  : 
its  bars  and  nails  are  rusty;  it  is  knitted  and  bound  to  its 
stanchions  by  creeping  tendrils  of  ivy,  showing  that  it  has 
never  been  opened.  A  bat  hovers  about  it ;  its  threshold  is 
overgrown  with  brambles,  nettles,  and  fruitless  corn — the  wild 
grass  "  whereof  the  mower  filleth  not  his  hand,  nor  he  that 
bindeth  the  sheaves  his  bosom."  Christ  approaches  it  in  the 
night-time — Christ,  in  his  everlasting  offices  of  prophet,  priest, 
and  king.  He  wears  the  white  robe,  representing  the  power 
of  the  Spirit  upon  him ;  the  jewelled  robe  and  breast-plate, 
representing  the  sacerdotal  investiture ;  the  rayed  crown  of 
gold,  inwoven  with  the  crown  of  thorns ;  not  dead  thorns,  but 
now  bearing  soft  leaves,  for  the  healing  of  the  nations. 

!N"ow,  when  Christ  enters  any  human  heart,  he  bears  with 
him  a  twofold  light :  first,  the  light  of  conscience,  which  displays 


1854.]  "THE   LIGHT   OF  THE   WORLD."  69 

past  sin,  and  afterwards  the  light  of  ])eace,  the  hope  of  salva- 
tion. The  lantern,  carried  in  Christ's  left  hand,  is  tliis  lii^dit  of 
conscience.  Its  lire  is  red  and  fierce ;  it  falls  only  on  the 
closed  door,  on  the  weeds  which  encnmber  it,  and  on  an  apple 
shaken  from  one  of  the  trees  of  the  orchard,  thus  marking  that 
the  entire  awakening  of  the  conscience  is  nut  nu-rrlv  to  com- 
mitted, but  to  hereditary  guilt. 

The  light  is  suspended  by  a  chain,  wrapt  about  the  wri&t  of 
the  ligure,  showing  that  the  light  which  reveals  sin  appears  to 
the  sinner  also  to  chain  the  hand  of  Christ. 

The  light  which  proceeds  from  the  head  of  the  figure,  on 
the  contrary,  is  that  of  the  hope  of  salvation  ;  it  springs  from 
the  crown  of  thorns,  and,  though  itself  sad,  subdued,  and  full 
of  softness,  is  yet  so  powerful  that  it  entirely  melts  into  the 
glow  of  it  the  forms  of  the  leaves  and  bonghs,  which  it  crosses, 
showing  that  every  earthly  object  must  be  hidden  by  this  light, 
where  its  sphere  extends. 

I  believe  there  are  very  few  persons  on  whom  the  picture, 
thus  justly  understood,  \vi\\  not  produce  a  deep  impression. 
For  my  own  part,  I  think  it  one  of  the  very  noblest  works  of 
sacred  art  ever  produced  in  this  or  any  other  age. 

It  may,  ])erhaps,  be  answered,  that  works  of  art  ought  not 
to  stand  in  need  of  interpretation  of  this  kind.  Indeed,  we 
have  been  so  long  accustomed  to  see  pictures  painted  without 
any  purpose  or  intention  whatsoever,  that  the  unexpected 
existence  of  meaning  in  a  work  of  art  may  very  naturally  at 
first  appear  to  us  an  unkind  demand  on  the  spectator's  under- 
standing. But  in  a  few  years  more  I  hope  the  English  public 
may  be  convinced  of  the  simple  truth,  that  neither  a  great 
fact,  nor  a  great  man,  nor  a  great  poem,  nor  a  great  ])icture, 
nor  any  other  great  thing,  can  be  fathomed  to  the  very  bottom 
in  a  moment  of  time ;  and  that  no  high  enjoyment,  either  in 
picture-seeing  or  any  other  occupation,  is  consistent  with  a 
total  lethargy  of  the  powers  of  the  understanding. 

As  far  as  regards  the  technical  qualities  of  Mr.  Hunt's 
painting,  I  would  only  ask  the  spectator  to  observe  this  differ- 
ence between   true  prcC-Raphaelite  work   and   its   imitations. 


70  LETTEES   01s    ART.  [1854. 

The  true  work  represents  all  objects  exactly  as  they  would 
appear  in  nature  in  the  position  and  at  tiie  distances  which  the 
arrangement  of  the  picture  supposes.  The  false  work  repre- 
sents them  with  all  their  details,  as  if  seen  through  a  microscope. 
Examine  closely  the  ivy  on  the  door  in  Mr.  Hunt's  picture, 
and  there  will  not  be  found  in  it  a  single  clear  outline.  All 
is  the  most  exquisite  mystery  of  color ;  becoming  reality  at  its 
due  distance.  In  like  manner  examine  the  small  gems  on  the 
robe  of  the  figure.  ]Xot  one  will  be  made  out  in  form,  and  yet 
there  is  not  one  of  all  those  minute  points  of  green  color,  but 
it  has  two  or  three  distinctly  varied  shades  of  green  in  it,  giving 
it  mysterious  value  and  lustre. 

The  spurious  imitations  of  pr[ie-Ilaphaelite  work  represent 
the  most  minute  leaves  and  other  objects  with  sharp  outlines, 
but  with  no  variety  of  color,  and  with  none  of  the  concealment, 
none  of  the  infinity  of  nature.  With  this  spurious  work  the 
walls  of  the  Academy  are  half  covered ;  of  the  true  school  one 
vei-y  small  exam2:)le  may  be  pointed  out,  being  hung  so  low  that 
it  might  otherwise  escape  attention.  It  is  not  by  any  means 
perfect,  but  still  very  lovely — the  study  of  a  calm  pool  in  a 
mountain  brook,  by  Mr.  J.  Dearie,  l^o.  191,  "  Evening,  on  the 
Marchno,  North  AYales."  * 

I  have  the  honor  to  be.  Sir, 

Your  obedient  servant. 
The  Author  of  ''Modern  Painters." 
Denmark  Hill,  May  4. 

*  Mr.  Dearie  informs  me  that  this  picture  was  bought  from  the  walls  of 
the  Academy  by  a  prize-holder  in  the  Art  Union  of  London.  He  adds  lliat 
the  purchaser  resided  iu  either  America  or  Australia,  and  that  the  picture  is 
now,  therefore,  presumably  in  one  or  other  of  those  countries. 


1854.]  *'THE   AWAKENING   CONSCIENCE."  71 


[From  "The  Times,"  May  25,  1854.] 

"  THE  AWAKENING  CONSCIENCE." 
By  Holman  Hunt. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times" 

Sir:  Your  kind  insertion  of  my  notes  on  Mr.  Hunt's 
principal  picture  encourages  me  to  hope  that  you  may  yet 
allow  me  room  in  your  columns  for  a  few  words  respecting  his 
second  work  in  the  Koyal  Academy,  the  "Awakening  Con- 
science." Xot  that  this  picture  is  obscure,  or  its  story  feebly 
told.  I  am  at  a  loss  to  know  how  its  meaning  could  be 
rendered  more  distinctly,  but  assuredly  it  is  not  understood. 
People  gaze  at  it  in  a  blank  wonder,  and  leave  it  hopelessly  ;  so 
that,  though  it  is  almost  an  insult  to  the  painter  to  explain  his 
thoughts  in  this  instance,  I  cannot  persuade  myself  to  leave  it 
thus  misunderstood.  The  poor  girl  has  been  sitting  singing  with 
her  seducer  ;  some  chance  words  of  the  song,  "  Oft  in  the  stilly 
night,"  have  struck  upon  tlie  numbed  places  of  her  heart ;  she 
has  started  up  in  agony ;  he,  not  seeing  her  face,  goes  on  sing- 
ing, striking  the  keys  carelessly  witli  his  gloved  hand. 

I  suppose  that  no  one  possessing  the  slightest  knowledge  of 
expression  could  remain  untouched  by  the  countenance  of  the 
lost  girl,  rent  from  its  beauty  into  sudden  horror  ;  the  lips  half 
open,  indistinct  in  their  purple  quivering ;  the  teeth  set  hard  ; 
the  eyes  filled  with  the  fearful  light  of  futurity,  and  with  teai-s 
of  ancient  days.  But  I  can  easily  understand  that  to  many 
persons  the  careful  rendering  of  the  inferior  details  in  this 
picture  cannot  but  be  at  first  offensive,  as  calling  their  attention 
away  from  the  principal  subject.  It  is  true  that  detail  of  this 
kind  has  long  been  so  carelessly  rendered,  that  the  perfect 
finishing  of  it  becomes  a  matter  of  curiosity,  and  therefore  an 
interruption  to  serious  thought.  But,  without  entering  into 
the  question  of  the  general  propriety  of  such  treatment,  I 
would  only  observe  that,  at  least  in  this  instance,  it  is  based  f»n 


72  LETTEKS   OK   ART.  [1854. 

a  truer  principle  of  the  pathetic  than  any  of  the  common 
artistical  expedients  of  the  schools.  Nothing  is  more  notable 
than  the  way  in  which  even  the  most  trivial  objects  force 
themselves  upon  the  attention  of  a  mind  which  has  been  fevered 
by  violent  and  distressful  excitement.  They  thrust  themselves 
forward  with  a  ghastly  and  unendurable  distinctness,  as  if  they 
would  compel  the  sufferer  to  count,  or  measure,  or  learn  them 
by  heart.  Even  to  the  mere  spectator  a  strange  interest  exalts 
the  accessories  of  a  scene  in  which  he  bears  witness  to  human 
soiTow.  There  is  not  a  single  object  in  all  that  room — com- 
mon, modern,  vulgar  (in  the  vulgar  sense,  as  it  may  be),  but  it 
becomes  tragical,  if  rightly  read.  Tliat  furniture  so  carefully 
painted,  even  to  the  last  vein  of  the  rosewood — is  there 
nothing  to  be  learnt  from  that  terrible  lustre  of  it,  from  its 
fatal  newness ;  nothing  there  that  has  the  old  thoughts  of 
home  upon  it,  or  that  is  ever  to  become^  a  j^art  of  home  'i 
Those  embossed  books,  vain  and  useless, — they  also  new, — 
marked  with  no  happy  wearing  of  beloved  leaves;  the  torn 
and  dying  bird  upon  the  floor;  the  gilded  tapestry,  with  the 
fowls  of  the  air  feeding  on  the  ripened  corn  ;  the  picture  above 
the  fireplace,  with  its  single  drooping  figure — tlie  woman  taken 
in  adulteiy ;  nay,  the  very  hem  of  the  poor  girl's  dress,  i\t 
which  the  painter  has  labored  so  closely,  thread  by  thread,  has 
story  in  it,  if  we  think  how  soon  its  pure  whiteness  may  be 
soiled  with  dust  and  rain,  her  outcast  feet  failing  in  the  street; 
and  the  fair  garden  flowers,  seen  in  that  reflected  sunshine  of 
the  mirror — these  also  have  their  language — 

"  Hope  not  to  find  delight  in  us,  tliey  say, 
For  we  are  spotless,  Jessy — we  are  pure."* 

I  surely  need  not  go  on.     Examine  the  whole  range  of  the 
walls  of  the  Academy, — nay,  examine  those  of  all  our  public 

'^  Slieustone:    Elegy  xxvi.     The  subject  of  the  poem  is  that  of  the 
picture  described  here.     The  girl  speaks — 

"  If  through  the  garden's  flowery  tribes  I  stray, 
Where  bloom  the  jasmines  that  could  once  allure, 
Hope  not,"  etc. 


1858.]  PKE-KAPHAELITISM    IK    LIVERPOOL.  -         73 

and  private  galleries, — and  while  pictures  will  be  met  with  by 
the  thousand  which  literally  tempt  to  evil,  by  the  thousand 
which  are  directed  to  the  meanest  trivialities  of  incident  or 
emotion,  by  the  thousand  to  the  delicate  fancies  of  inactive 
relii^ion,  there  will  not  be  found  one  })o\VL'rful  as  this  to  meet 
full  in  the  front  the  moral  evil  of  the  age  in  which  it  is  painted  ; 
to  waken  into  mercy  the  cruel  thoughtlessness  of  youth,  and 
subdue  the  severities  of  judgment  into  the  sanctity  of  com- 
passion. 

I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir, 

Your  obedient  servant, 
The  Author  of  "Modern  Pmnters." 
Denmabk  Hill. 


[From  '*  The  Liverpool  Albion,"  January  11, 1858.] 
PRE-RAPHAELiriSM  IN  LIVERPOOL* 

I  believe  the  Liverpool  Academy  has,  in  its  decisions  of 
late  years,  given  almost  the  first  instance  on  record  of  the 
entirely  just  and  beneficial  working  of  academical  system. 
Usually  such  systems  have  degenerated  into  the  application  of 
formal  rules,  or  the  giving  partial  votes,  or  the  distribution  of 
a  partial  patronage ;  but  the  Liverpool  awards  have  indicated 
at  once  the  keen  perception  of  new  forms  of  excellence,  and 
the  frank  honesty  by  which  alone  such  new  forms  can  be  con- 
fessed and  accepted.     I  do  not,  however,  wonder  at  the  outcry. 

*  The  prize  of  the  Liverpool  Academy  was  awarded  in  1858  to  ^lillais's 
"Blind  Girl,"  Popular  feeling,  however,  favored  another  picture,  the 
"  "Waiting  for  the  Verdict"  of  A.  Solomon,  and  a  good  deal  of  discussion 
arose  as  to  whether  the  prize  had  been  rightly  awarded.  As  one  of  the 
judges,  and  as  a  member  of  the  Academy,  Mr.  Alfred  Hunt  aiidresscd  a 
letter  on  the  matter  to  Mr.  Ruskin,  the  main  portion  of  whose  reply  was 
gent  by  him  to  the  Liverpool  Albion  and  is  now  reprinted  here.  Mr.  Solo- 
mon's picture  had  been  exhibited  in  the  Royal  Academy  of  1857  (No.  662), 
and  is  mentioned  iu  Mr.  Ruskin'.s  Notes  to  the  pictures  of  that  year  (p.  32). 


74  LETTERS    ON    ART.  [1858. 

People  who  suppose  the  pre-Raphaelite  work  to  be  only  a  con- 
dition of  meritorious  eccentricity,  naturally  suppose,  also,  that 
the  consistent  preference  of  it  can  only  be  owing  to  clique. 
Most  people  look  upon  paintings  as  they  do  on  plants  or 
minerals,  and  think  they  ought  to  have  in  their  collections 
specimens  of  everybody's  work,  as  they  have  specimens  of  all 
earths  or  flowers.  They  have  no  conception  that  there  is  such 
a  thing  as  a  real  right  and  wrong,  a  real  bad  and  good,  in  the 
question.  However,  you  need  not,  I  think,  much  mind.  Let 
the  Academy  be  broken  up  on  the  quarrel ;  let  the  Liverpool 
people  buy  whatever  rubbish  they  have  a  mind  to ;  and  when 
they  see,  as  in  time  they  will,  that  it  is  rubbish,  and  find,  as 
find  they  will,  every  pre-Rahpaelite  picture  gradually  advance 
in  influence  and  in  value,  you  will  be  acknowledged  to  have 
borne  a  witness  all  the  more  noble  and  useful,  because  it 
seemed  to  end  in  discomfiture ;  though  it  will  not  end  in  dis- 
comfiture. I  suppose  I  need  hardly  say  anything  of  my  own 
estimate  of  the  two  pictures  on  which  the  arbitrement  has  arisen. 
I  have  surely  said  often  enough,  in  good  black  type  already, 
wliat  I  thought  of  pre-Eaphaelite  works,  and  of  other  modern 
ones.  Since  Turners  death  I  consider  that  any  average  work 
from  the  hand  of  any  of  the  four  leaders  of  pre-'Raphaelitism 
(Rosetti,  Millais,  Hunt,  John  Lewis)  is,  singly,  worth  at  least 
th?'ee  of  any  other  pictures  whatever  by  living  artists. 

John  Ruskin. 


[From  "  The  Witness"  (Edinburgh),  March  27,  1858.1 

GENEBALIZATION  AND  THE  SCOTCH  PBE-MAPHAELITES. 

To  tJie  Editor  of  "  The  Witness." 

I  was  very  glad  to  see  that  good  and  firm  defence  of  the 
pre-Raj^haelite  Brothers  in  the  Wit7iess  ^  the  other  day  ;  only, 

"  The  defence  was  made  iu  a  second  notice  (March  6,  1858)  of  the 
Exhibition  of  the  Royal  Scottish  Academy,  then  open  to  the  public.  The 
picture  of  Mr.  Waller  Patou  (now  U.S.A.)  alluded  to  here  was  entitled 
"AVild  Water,  Inveruglass"  (161);  he  also  exhibited  one  of   "Arrochar 


1858.]  THE    SCOTCH    PRE-RAPHAELITES.  75 

my  dciir  Editor,  it  appears  to  me  tliut  you  t:ike  too  miu-h 
trouble  in  the  mutter.  Such  a  lovely  picture  as  that  of  Waller 
Patou's  must  either  speak  for  itself,  or  nobody  can  speak  for 
it.  If  you  Scotch  people  don't  know  a  bit  of  your  own 
country  when  you  see  it,  who  is  to  help  you  to  know  it  (  If, 
in  that  mighty  wise  town  of  Edinburgh,  everybody  still  likes 
flourishes  of  brush  better  than  ferns,  and  dots  of  paint  better 
than  birclf  leaves,  surely  there  is  nothing  for  it  but  to  leave 
them  in  quietude  of  devotion  to  dot  and  faith  in  flourish. 
At  least  I  can  see  no  other  way  of  dealing.  All  those  j)lati- 
tudes  from  the  Scotsmaii^  which  you  took  the  pains  to  answer, 
have  been  answered  ten  thousand  times  already,  without  the 
smallest  effect — the  kind  of  people  who  utter  them  being 
always  too  misty  in  their  notions  ever  to  feel  or  catch  an 
answer.  You  may  as  well  speak  to  the  air,  or  rather  to  a 
Scotch  mist.  The  oddest  part  of  the  business  is,  that  all  those 
wretched  fallacies  about  generalization  might  be  quashed  or 
crushed  in  an  instant,  by  reference  to  any  given  picture  of 
any  great  master  who  ever  lived.  There  never  was  anybody 
who  generalized,  since  paint  was  first  ground,  except  Opie, 
and  Benjamin  West,  and  Fuseli,  and  one  or  two  other  such 
modern  stars — in  their  own  estimates, — night-lights,  in  fact, 
extinguishing  themselves,  not  odoriferously  at  daybreak,  in  a 
sputter  in  the  saucer.  Titian,  Giorgione,  Yeronese,  Tintoret, 
Raphael,  Leonardo,  Correggio — never  any  of  them  dreamt  of 
generalization,  and  would  have  rejected  the  dream  as  having 
come  by  the  horn  gate,'^  if  they  had.  The  only  difference 
between  them  and  the  pre-Raphaelites  is,  that  the  latter  love 
nature  better,  and  don't  yet  know  their  artist's  business  so 
well,  having  everything  to  find  out  for  themselves  athwart  all 
sorts  of  contradiction,  poor  fellows ;  so  they  are  apt  to  jnit  too 

Road,  Tarbet  "  (314).  The  platitudes  of  the  Srofsman  against  the  i>n'- 
Kaphaelites  were  contained  in  its  second  notice  of  the  Exhibition  (Fc  hru- 
ary  20.  1858). 

*  Tliere  must  be  some  error  here,  as  it  is  tlie  true  dreams  that  come 
through  the  horn  gate,  while  the  fruitless  ones  pass  througli  the  gale  of 
ivoi-i/.     The  allusion  is  to  Homer  (Odyssey,  xix.  o62). 


76  LETTEKS    OX    ART.  [1858. 

much  into  their  pictures — for  love's  sake,  and  then  not  to 
bring  this  much  into  perfect  harmony ;  not  yet  being  able  to 
bridle  their  thoughts  entirely  with  tlie  master's  hand.  I  don't 
say  therefore — I  never  have  said — that  their  pictures  are 
faultless — many  of  them  have  gross  faults ;  but  the  modern 
pictures  of  the  generalist  school,  which  are  opposed  to  them, 
have  nothing  else  but  faults :  they  are  not  pictures  at  all,  but 
pure  daubs  and  perfect  blunders ;  nay,  they  have  never  had 
aim  enough  to  be  called  anything  so  honorable  as  blunders ; 
they  are  mere  emptinesses  and  idlenesses — thistledown  with- 
out seeds,  and  bubbles  without  color ;  whereas  the  worst  pre- 
Kaphaelite  picture  has  something  in  it ;  and  the  great  ones, 
such  as  Windus's  "  Burd  Helen,"  ^  will  hold  their  own  with 
the  most  noble  pictures  of  all  time. 

•    Always  faithfully  yours, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

By  the  way,  what  ails  you  at  our  pre-Raphaelite  Brothers' 
conceits  ?     Windus's   heart's-ease   might   have  been   a  better 

*  In  illustration  of  the  old  Scottish  ballad  of  "Burd  Helen,"  who,  fear- 
ing her  lover's  desertion,  followed  him,  dressed  as  a  foot-page,  through 
flood,  if  not  through  fire — 

"  Lord  John  he  rode,  Burd  Helen  ran, 
The  live-lang  sumer's  day, 
Until  they  cam'  to  Clyde's  Water, 
Was  filled  frae  bank  to  brae, 

"  '  See'st  thou  yon  water,  Helen,'  quoth  he, 
'  That  flows  frae  bank  to  brim? ' 
'  I  trust  to  God,  Lord  John,'  she  said, 
'  You  ne'er  will  see  me  swim.' " 

This  picture  (No.  141  in  the  Edinburgh  Exhibition  of  1858)  was  first 
exhibited  in  the  Royal  Academy  of  1856.  In  the  postscript  to  his  Academy 
Notes  of  that  year,  Mr.  Ruskin,  after  commenting  on  the  "  crying  error  of 
putting  it  nearly  out  of  sight,"  so  that  he  had  at  first  hardly  noticed  it, 
estimates  this  picture  as  second  only  to  the  "Autumn  Leaves"  of  Mr.  Mil- 
lais  in  that  exhibition.  The  following  is  a  portion  of  his  comment  on  it: 
"I  see  just  enough  of  the  figures  to  make  me  sure  that  tlie  work  is 
thoughtful  and  intense  in  the  highest  degree.  The  pressure  of  the  girl's 
hand  on  her  side;  her  wild,  firm,  desolate  look  at  the  stream — she  not  rais- 
ing her  eyes  as  she  makes  her  appeal,  for  fear  of  the  greater  mercllessness 


J 


1858.]  THE    SCOTCH    PRE-RAPHAELITES.  77 

conceit,  I  grant  y<Tii;*  but  for  tlie  conceits  themselves,  as 
such,  I  always  eujoj  them  particularly ;  and  I  don't  under- 
stand why  I  shouldn't.     What's  wrong  in  them  ? 

in  the  liuman  look  than  in  the  glaze  of  the  gliding  water— the  just  choice 
of  the  type  of  the  rider's  cruel  face,  and  of  the  scene  itself— so  terrible  in 
haggardiiess  of  rattling  stones  and  ragged  heath,— are  all  marks  of  the 
action  of  the  very  grandest  imaginative  power,  shortened  only  of  liold 
upon  our  feelings,  because  dealing  with  a  subject  too  fearful  to  be  for  a 
moment  believed  true." 

The  picture  was  originally  purchased  by  Mr.  John  :Miller,  of  Liverpool; 
at  the  sale  of  whose  collection  by  Christie  and  ^lanson,  two  years  later,  in 
1858,  it  fetched  the  price  of  two  hundred  guineas.  At  the  same  sale  the 
"Blind  Girl, "alluded  to  in  the  previous  letter,  was  sold  for  three  hundred. 

For  the  poem  illustrated  by  the  picture,  see  Aytoun's  "  Ballads  of  Scot- 
land," i.  239,  where  a  slightly  different  version  of  it  is  given:  it  may  also 
be  found  in  "  Percy's  Reliques"  (vol.  iii.  p.  59),  under  the  title  of  "Child 
Waters."  Other  versions  of  this  ballad,  and  other  ballads  of  the  same 
name,  and  probably  origin,  may  be  found  in  Jameson's  collection,  vol.  i. 
p.  117,  vol.  ii.  p.  376,  in  Buchan's  "  Ancient  Ballads  of  the  North,"  ii.  29 
(1879  ed.)  and  in  "Four  Books  of  Scottish  Ballads,"  Edin.,  1868,  Bk.  ii.  p. 
21,  where  it  is  well  noted  that  "Burd  Helen"  corresponds  to  the  "  Proud 
Elise"  of  northern  minstrels,  "La  Prude  Dame  Elise"  of  the  French,  and 
the  "  Gentle  Lady  Elise"  of  the  English — (Burd,  Prud,  Preux).  It  is  also 
possible  that  it  is  a  corruption  of  Burdalayn,  or  Burdalane,  meaning  an  only 
child,  a  maiden,  etc. 

*  The  Witness  had  objected  to  the  "astonishing  fondness"  of  the  pre- 
Raphaelite  school  for  "  conceits,"  instancing  as  typically  far-fetched  that 
in  the  picture  of  "Burd  Helen,"  wiiere  Lord  John  was  represented  "pull- 
ing to  pieces  a  heart's-ease, "  as  lie  crosses  the  stream. 


LETTERS   ON  ART. 


IV. 
TUKNER. 


The  Turner  Bequest.     1856. 

The  Turner  Bequest  and  the  National  Gallery.     1857. 

The  Turner   Sketches  and  Drawings.     1858. 

The  Turner  Gallery   at  Kensington.    1859. 

Turner's  Drawings.     1876  (July  5). 

Turner's  Drawings.     1876  (July  19). 

Copies  of  Tltiner's  Drawings.    1876. 

"Turner's,"  False  and  True.    1871. 

The  Character  of  Turner.    1857. 


lY. 

TURNER 

[From  "  The  Tinu-s,"  October  28,  1856.] 

THE    TURXER   BEQUEST. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times." 

Sir  :  As  active  measures  are  being  now  ^  taken  to  give  the 
public  access  to  the  pictures  and  drawings  left  by  tlie  late  Mr. 
Turner,  you  will  perhaps  allow  me  space  in  your  columns  for 
a  few  words  respecting  them. 

I  was  appointed  by  Mr.  Turner  one  of  his  executors.  I 
examined  the  will,  and  tlie  state  of  the  property  needing 
administration,  and,  finding  that  the  questions  arising  out  of 
the  obscurity  of  the  one  and  the  disorder  of  the  other  would 
be  numerous  and  would  involve  a  kind  of  business  in  which  I 
had  no  skill  or  knowledge,  I  resigned  the  office ;  but  in  the 
course  of  the  inquiry  I  catalogued  the  most  interesting  of  the 
drawings  which  are  now  national  property,  and  respecting 
these  the  public  will,  I  thiidv,  be  glad  of  more  definite  infor- 
mation than  they  at  present  possess.  They  are  referable 
mainly  to  three  classes. 

1.  Finished  water-color  drawings. 

2.  Studies  from  nature,  or  first  thoughts  for  pictures;  in 
color. 

3.  Sketches  in  pencil  or  pen  and  ink. 

*  The  first  exliibltion  of  Turner's  pictures  after  liis  death  was  opened  at 
Marlborough  House  early  in  November,  1856,  seven  montlis  subsequent  to 
the  final  decision  as  to  the  proper  distribution  of  the  property,  which  was 
the  subject  of  Turner's  will. 


8-  LETTERS    0:N"    ART. 


[1856. 


Tiie  drawings  belonging  to  the  two  latter  classes  are  in 
various  stages  of  completion,  and  would  -contain,  if  rightly 
arranged,  a  perfect  record  of  the  movements  of  the  masters 
mind  during  his  wdiole  life.  Many  of  them  were  so  confused 
among  prints  and  waste-paper  that  I  could  neither  collect  nor 
catalogue  thein  all  in  the  time  I  had  at  my  disposal ;  some 
portfolios  I  was  not  able  even  to  open.  The  following  state- 
ment, therefore,  omits  mention  of  many,  and  I  believe  even  of 
some  large  water-color  drawings.  There  are  in  the  first  class 
forty-five  drawings  of  the  "  Kivers  of  France ;"  fifty-seven 
illustrating  Eogers'  Poems;  twenty-three  of  the  '' Kiver 
Scenery"  and  "  Harbors  of  England  ;"  four  marine  vignettes ; 
five  middle-sized  drawings  (including  the  beautiful  "Ivy 
Bridge") ;  and  a  drawing,  some  three  feet  by  two,  finished 
with  exquisite  care,  of  a  scene  in  the  Yal  d' Aosta ;  total,  135. 

It  would  occupy  too  mnch  of  your  space  if  I  w^ere  to  specify 
all  the  various  kinds  of  studies  forming  the  second  class. 
Many  are  far  carried,  and  are,  to  my  mind,  more  precious  and 
lovely  than  any  finished  drawings  ;  respecting  some,  there  may 
be  question  whether  Turner  regarded  them  as  finished  or  not. 
The  larger  number  are  light  sketches,  valuable  only  to  artists, 
or  to  those  interested  in  the  processes  of  Turner's  mind  and 
hand.  The  total  number  of  those  which  I  catalogued  as 
important  is  1,757. 

The  sketches  of  the  third  class  are  usually  more  elaborate 
than  the  colored  ones.  They  consist  of  studies  from  nature, 
or  for  composition,  in  firm  outline,  usually  on  gray  paper, 
heightened  with  white.  They  include,  among  other  subjects, 
more  or  less  complete,  fifty  of  the  original  drawings  for  the 
Liber  Studiorum,  and  many  of  the  others  are  of  large  folio 
size.  The  total  of  those  I  consider  important  is  1,322.  Now 
the  value  of  these  sketches  to  the  public  consists  greatly,  first, 
in  the  j^reservation  of  each,  as  far  as  possible,  in  the  state  in 
which  Turner  left  it ;  secondly,  in  their  careful  arrangement 
and  explanation  ;  thirdly,  in  convenience  of  general  access  to 
them.     Permit  me  a  word  on  each  of  these  heads. 

Turner  was  in  the  habit  of  using:  unusual  vehicles,  and  in 


1856.]  THE    TURNEK    BEQUEST.  83 

the  colored  studies  many  hues  are  wroiii^ht  out  by  sinmilar 
means  and  witli  singular  delicacy — nearly  always  in  textures 
which  the  slightest  damp  (to  which  the  drawings  would  neces- 
sarily be  subjected  in  the  process  of  mounting)  would  assuredly 
alter.  I  have  made  many  experiments  in  mounting,  putting 
colored  drawings,  of  which  1  had  previously  examined  the 
tones,  into  the  hands  of  the  best  mounters,  and  I  have  never 
yet  had  a  drawing  returned  to  me  without  alteration.  The 
vast  mass  of  these  sketches,  and  the  comparative  slightness 
of  many,  would  but  too  probably  induce  a  carelessness  and 
generalization  in  the  treatment  they  might  have  to  undergo 
still  more  fatally  detrimental  to  them. 

Secondly,  a  large  number  are  without  names,  and  so  slight 
that  it  requires  careful  examination  and  somewhat  extended 
acquaintance  with  Turner's  works  to  ascertain  their  intention. 
The  sketches  of  this  class  are  nearly  valueless,  till  their  mean- 
ing is  deciphered,  but  of  great  interest  when  seen  in  their 
proper  connection.  Thus  there  are  three  progressive  siudies 
for  one  vignette  in  Rogers'  Italy"^  {Hannibal  passing  the  Alps), 
which  I  extricated  from  three  several  heaps  of  other  mountain 
sketches  with  which  they  had  no  connection.  Thirdly,  a  large 
number  of  the  drawings  are  executed  with  body  color,  the 
bloom  of  which  any  friction  or  handling  would  in  a  short 
period  destroy.  Their  delicate  tones  of  color  would  be  equally 
destroyed  by  continuous  exj^osure  to  the  light  or  to  smoke  and 
dust. 

Drawings  of  a  valuable  character,  when  thus  destructible, 
are  in  European  museums  hardly  accessible  to  the  general 
public.  But  there  is  no  need  for  this  seclusion.  They  should 
be  inclosed  each  in  a  light  wooden  frame,  under  a  glass  the 
surface  of  which  a  raised  mount  should  prevent  them  from 
touching.  These  frames  should  slide  into  cases,  containing 
about  tw^elve  drawings  each,  which  would  be  portable  to  any 
part  of  the  room  where  they  were  to  be  seen.  I  have  long 
kept  my  own  smaller  Turner  drawings  in  this  manner ;  fifteen 

*  See  Rogers'  "Italy,"  p.  29. 


84  LETTERS   OK   ART.  [1856. 

frames  going  into  tlie  depth  of  about  a  foot.  Men  are  usually 
accused  of  "  bad  taste,"  if  they  express  any  conviction  of  their 
own  ability  to  execute  any  given  work.  But  it  would  perhaps 
be  better  if  in  j^eople's  sayings  in  general,  whether  concerning 
others  or. themselves,  there  were  less  taste,  and  more  truth; 
and  I  think  it,  under  the  circumstances,  my  duty  to  state  that 
I  believe  none  would  treat  these  drawings  with  more  scrupulous 
care,  or  arrange  them  with  greater  patience,  than  I  should 
myself ;  that  I  am  ready  to  undertake  the  task,  and  enter  upon 
it  instantly ;  that  I  will  furnish,  in  order  to  prove  the  working 
of  the  system  jDroposed,  a  hundred  of  the  frames,  with  their 
cases,  at  my  own  cost;  and  that  within  six  weeks  of  the  day 
on  which  I  am  permitted  to  begin  work  (illness  or  accident 
not  interfering),  I  will  have  the  hundred  drawings  arranged, 
framed,  accompanied  by  a  printed  explanatory  catalogue,  and 
ready  for  public  inspection.  It  would  then  be  in  the  power  of 
the  commissioners  intrusted  with  the  administration  of  this 
portion  of  the  national  property  to  decide  if  any,  or  how  many 
more  of  the  sketches,  should  be  exhibited  in  the  same  manner, 
as  a  large  mass  of  the  less  interesting  ones  might  be  kept 
as  the  drawings  are  at  the  British  Museum,  and  shown  only  on 
special  inquiry. 

I  will  only  undertake  this  task  on  condition  of  the  entire 
management  of  the  drawings,  in  every  particular,  being 
intrusted  to  me  ;  but  I  should  ask  the  advice  of  Mr.  Carpenter, 
of  the  British  Museum,*  on  all  doubtful  points,  and  intrust 
any  necessary  operations  only  to  the  person  who  mounts  the 
drawings  for  the  British  Museum. 

I  make  this  offerf  in  your  columns  rather  than  privately, 
first,  because  I  wish  it  to  be  clearly  known  to  the  public ;  and 

*  William  Hookham  Carpenter,  for  many  j^ars  Keeper  of  the  prints 
and  drawings  at  the  British  j\Iuscum.     He  died  in  1866. 

f  Mr.  Ruskin's  offer  was  accepted,  and  he  eventually  arranged  the 
drawings,  and,  in  particular,  the  four  hundred  now  exhibited  in  one  of  the 
lower  rooms  of  the  National  Gallery,  and  contained  in  the  kind  of  cases 
above  proposed,  presented  by  Mr.  Ruskin  to  the  Gallery.  Mr.  Ruskin  also 
printed,  as  promised,  a  descriptive  and  explanatory  catalogue  of  a  hundred 
of  these  four  hundred  drawings.     (Catalogue  of  the  Turner  Sketches  in  the 


JCl^ 


86  LETTERS   OX   ART.  [1857. 

also  because  I  have  no  time  to  make  rep'esentations  in  official 
ways,  the  very  hours  which  I  could  give  to  the  work  needing 
to  be  redeemed  hj  allowing  none  to  be  wasted  in  formalities. 
I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.   EUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Oct.  27. 


[From  "The  Times,"  July  9,  1857.] 

TRE   TURNER   BEQUEST  AND    THE  NATIONAL    GALLERY. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times:' 

Sir  :  I  am  sorry  that  accident  has  prevented  my  seeing  the 
debate  of  Friday  lasf^  on  the  vote  for  the  National  Gallery 
until  to-day.  Will  you  permit  me,  thus  late,  to  correct  the 
statement  made  by  Lord  Elcho,  that  I  offered  to  arrange  Tur- 
ner's pictures,  or  could  have  done  so  as  well  as  Mr.  AVornum  ?f 

National  Gallery.  For  private  circulation.  Part  I.  1857. — Only  one  hun- 
dred copies  printed,  and  no  further  parts  issued.) 

"Writing  (1858)  to  Mr.  Norton  of  his  whole  work  in  arranging  the  Turner 
drawings,  Mr.  Ruskin  said:  "To  show  you  a  little  what  my  work  has 
been,  I  have  fac-similed  for  jou,  as  nearly  as  I  could,  one  of  the  nineteen 
thousand  sketches  (comprised  in  the  Turner  bequest).  It,  like  most  of 
them,  is  not  a  sketch,  but  a  group  of  sketches,  made  on  both  sides  of  the 
leaf  of  the  note-book.  The  note-books  vary  in  contents  from  sixty  to 
ninety  leaves:  there  are  about  two  hundred  books  of  the  kind — three  hun- 
dred and  odd  note-books  in  all;  and  each  le^f  has  on  an  average  this 
quantity  of  work,  a  great  many  leaves  being  slighter,  some  blank,  but  a 
great  many  also  elaborate  in  the  highest  degree,  some  containing  ten 
exquisite  compositions  on  each  side  of  the  leaf,  thus  (see  facsimile),  each 
no  bigger  than  this— and  with  about  that  quantity  of  work  in  each,  but 
every  touch  of  it  inestimable,  done  with  his  whole  soul  in  it.  Generally 
the  slighter  sketches  are  written  over  it  everywhere,  as  in  the  example 
inclosed,  every  incident  being  noted  that  was  going  on  at  the  moment  of 
the  sketch." — "List  of  Turner's  Drawings  shown  in  connection  with  Mr. 
Norton's  Lectures."  Boston:  1874.  p.  11.  The  facsimile  alluded  toby 
Mr.  Norton  is  reproduced  here. 

*  July  3,  1857,  upon  the  vote  of  £23,165  for  the  National  Gallery. 

f  The  late  Mr.  Ralph  Nicholson  Wornum,  who  succeeded  Mr.  Uwins  as 
Keeper  of  the  National  Gallery  in  1855,  and  retained  that  office  till  his 
death  in  1878. 


1857.]  THE   TL-KN'EK    BEQUEST.  87 

I  only  offered  to  arrange  the  sketelies,  and  tliat  I  am  doing; 
but  1  never  would  have  undertaken  the  pictures,  which  were  in 
such  a  state  of  decay  that  1  had  given  up  many  for  lost  ;  while, 
also,  most  of  them  belonged  to  periods  of  Turner's  work  with 
which  I  was  little  acquainted.  Mr.  Wornnm's  ])atience  and 
carefulness  of  research  in  discovering  their  subjects,  dates  of 
exhibition,  and  other  points  of  interest  connected  with  them, 
have  been  of  the  greatest  service ;  and  it  will  be  long  before 
the  labor  and  judgment  which  he  has  shown  in  compiling,  not 
only  this,  but  all  the  various  catalogues  now  used  by  the  public 
at  our  galleries,  will  be  at  all  justly  appreciated.  I  find  more 
real,  serviceable,  and  trustworthy  facts  in  one  of  these  cata- 
loojues,  than  in  half  a  dozen  of  the  common  collections  of  lives 
of  painters. 

Permit  me  to  add  further,  that  during  long  residence  in 
Venice  I  have  carefully  examined  the  Paul  W'ronese  lately 
purchased  by  the  Government."^  When  I  last  saw  it,  it  was 
simply  the  best  Veronese  in  Italy,  if  not  in  Europe  (the 
''Marriage  inCana"  of  the  Louvre  is  larger  and  more  nuignili- 
cent,  but  not  so  perfect  in  finish)  ;  and,  for  my  own  part,  I 
should  think  no  price  too  large  for  it ;  but  putting  my  own 
deep  reverence  for  the  painter  wholly  out  of  the  question,  and 
considering  the  matter  as  it  will  appear  to  most  persons  at  all 

*  "  The  Family  of  Darius  at  the  feet  of  Alexander  after  the  Battle  of 
Issus,"  purchased  at  Venice  from  the  Pisani  collection  in  ISoT.  Lord  Elcho 
had  complained  iu  the  course  of  the  debate  that  the  price,  £18.650.  paid  for 
this  picture,  had  been  excessive;  and  in  reply  allusion  was  made  to  the  still 
higher  price  (£23,000)  paid  for  the  "Immaculate  Conception"  of  Murillo, 
purchased  for  the  Louvre  by  Napoleon  IIL.  in  1852,  from  the  collection  of 
Marshal  Soult.— Of  the  great  Veronese,  ^Ir.  Ruskin  also  wrote  thus:  "  It  at 
once,  to  my  mind,  raises  our  National  Gallery  from  a  second-rate  to  a  first- 
vate  collection.  I  have  always  loved  the  master,  and  given  much  time  to 
the  study  of  his  works,  but  this  is  the  best  I  have  ever  seen."  (Turner 
Notes,  1857,  ed.  v.,  p.  89,  note.)  So  again  before  the  National  Gallery 
Commission,  earlier  in  the  same  year,  he  had  .said.  "  I  am  rejoiced  to  hear 
(of  its  rumored  purchase).  If  it  is  confirmed,  nothing  will  liave  criven  me 
such  pleasure  for  a  long  time.  I  think  ii  is  the  most  precious  Paul  Veronese 
in  the  world,  as  far  as  the  completeness  of  the  picture  goes,  and  quite  a 
priceless  picture." 


S8  LETTERS    OX   ART.  [1858. 

acquainted  with  tlie  real  character  and  range  of  Venetian  work, 
1  believe  the  market  value  of  the  picture  ought  to  be  estimated 
at  perhaps  une-third  more  than  the  Government  have  paid  for 
it.  Without  doubt  the  price  of  the  Murillo  lately  purchased 
at  Paris  was  much  enhanced  by  accidental  competition ;  under 
ordinary  circumstances,  and  putting  both  the  pictures  to  a  fair 
trial  of  market  value,  I  believe  the  Veronese  to  be  worth  at 
least  double  the  Murillo ;  in  an  artistical  point  of  view,  the 
latter  picture  could  not  bo  put  in  any  kind  of  comparison  what- 
ever with  the  Veronese. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.  RUSKIN. 

Oxford,  July  7. 


[From  "The  Literary  Gazette,"  November  13,  1858— partly  reprinted  in  "The  Two 
Paths,"  Appendix  iv.] 


THE  TURNER  SKETCHES  AND  DRAWINGS* 

To  tlu  Editor  of  "  The  Literary  Gazette:' 

Sir  :  I  do  not  think  it  generally  necessary  to  answer  criti- 
cism ;  yet  as  yours  is  the  first  sufficient  notice  wdiicli  has  been 
taken  of  the  important  collection  of  sketches  at  Marlborough 
House,  and  as  your  strictures  on  the  arrangement  proposed  for 
the  body  of  the  collection,  as  well  as  on  some  statements  in  my 
catalogue,  are  made  with  such  candor  and  good  feeling,  will 
you  allow  me  to  offer  one  or  two  observations  in  reply  to  them  ? 
The  mode  of  arrangement  to  which  you  refer  as  determined  on 

*The  present  letter  was  written  in  reply  to  a  criticism,  contained  in  the 
Literary  Gazette  of  November  6,  1858,  on  Mr.  Ruskin's  "  Catalogae  of  the 
Turner  Sketches  and  Drawings  exhibited  at  Marlborough  House  1857-8." 
The  subjects  of  complaint  made  by  the  Gazette  sufficiently  appear  from 
this  letter.  They  were,  briefly,  first,  the  mode  of  exhibition  of  the  Turner 
Drawings  proposed  by  Mr.  Ruskin  in  his  official  report  already  alluded  to, 
pp.  78  and  80.  note;  and,  secondly,  two  alleged  hyperboles  and  one  omis- 
sion in  the  Catalosue  itself. 


1858.1  TURNER    SKETCHES    AND    DRAWINGS.  89 

by  tlie  trustees  lias  been  adopted,  not  to  discourage  the  study 
of  the  drawings  by  the  pubUc,  but  to  put  all  more  completely 
at  their  service.  Drawings  so  small  in  size  and  so  delicate  in 
execution  cannot  be  seen,  far  less  copied,  when  hung  on  walls. 
As  now  arranged,  they  can  be  put  into  the  hands  of  each  visi- 
tor, or  student,  as  a  book  is  into  those  of  a  reader;  he  may 
examine  tliem  in  any  hght,  or  in  any  position,  and  copy  tlicm 
at  his  case.  The  students  who  v:ork  from  drawings  exhibited 
on  walls  will,  I  am  sure,  bear  willing  witness  to  the  greater 
convenience  of  the  new^  system.  Four  hundred  drawings  are 
already  thus  arranged  for  pubhc  use;  framed,  and  disposed  in 
eighty  portable  boxes,  each  containing  five  sketches,  so  that 
eighty  students  might  at  once  be  supphed  witli  five  drawings 
apiece.  The  oil  paintings  at  Marlborough  House,  comprising 
as  they  do  the  most  splendid  works  which  Turner  ever  pro- 
duced, and  the  339  drawings  exliibited  beside  them,  are  surely 
enough  for  the  amusement  of  loungers — for  do  you  consider  as 
anything  better  than  loungers  those  persons  wdio  do  not  care 
enough  for  the  Turner  drawings  to  be  at  the  trouble  of  apply- 
ing for  a  ticket  of  admission,  and  entering  their  names  in  a 
book — that  is  to  say,  who  will  not,  to  obtain  the  privilege  of 
quiet  study  of  perfect  art,  take,  once  for  all,  as  much  trouble 
as  would  be  necessary  to  register  a  letter,  or  book,  or  parcel  ? 

I  entirely  waive  for  the  moment  the  question  of  exposure 
to  light.  I  put  the  whole  issue  on  the  ground  of  greatest  pub- 
lic convenience.  I  believjB  it  to  be  better  for  the  public  to 
have  two  collections  of  Turner's  drawings  than  one ;  nay,  it 
seems  to  me  just  the  perfection  of  all  privilege  to  have  one 
gallef^  for  quiet,  another  for  disquiet ;  one  into  which  the 
curious,  idle,  or  speculative  may  crowd  on  wet  or  weai-y  days, 
and  another  in  which  people  desirous  of  either  thinking  or 
working  seriously  may  always  find  peace,  light,  and  elbow- 
room.  I  believe,  therefore,  that  the  present  disposition  of  these 
drawings  will  be  at  once  the  most  cdnvenient  and  the  most 
just,  even  supposing  that  the  finest  works  of  Turner  would  not 
be  injured  by  constant  exposure.  But  that  they  would  be  so 
admits  of  no  debate.     It  is  not  on  my  judgment  nor  on  any 


90  LETTERS   OK   ART.  [1858. 

other  unsnpported  opinion,  that  the  trustees  have  acted,  but  in 
consideration  of  facts  now  universally  admitted  by  persons  who 
have  charge  of  drawnigs.  You  will  find  that  the  officers  both 
of  the  Louvre  and  of  the  British  Museum  refuse  to  expose  their 
best  drawings  or  missal-pages  to  light,  in  consequence  of  ascer- 
tained damage  received  by  such  drawings  as  have  been  already 
exposed ;  and  among  the  works  of  Turner  I  am  prepared  to 
name  an  example  in  which,  the  frame  having  protected  a  por- 
tion while  the  rest  was  exposed,  the  covered  portion  is  still  rich 
and  lovely  in  colors,  while  the  exposed  spaces  are  reduced  in 
some  parts  nearly  to  white  paper,  and  the  color  in  general  to  a 
dull  brown. 

You  allude  to  the  contrary  chance  that  some  hues  may  be 
injured  by  darkness.  I  believe  that  some  colors  are  indeed 
liable  to  darken  in  perpetual  shade,  but  not  while  occasionally 
exposed  to  moderate  light,  as  these  drawings  will  be  in  daily 
use ;  nor  is  any  liability  to  injury,  even  by  perpetual  shade,  as 
yet  demonstrable  with  respect  to  the  Turner  drawings  ;  on  the 
contrary,  those  which  now  form  the  great  body  of  the  national 
collection  were  never  out  of  Turner's  house  until  his  death,  and 
were  all  kept  by  him  in  tight  bundles  or  in  clasped  books  ;  and 
all  the  drawings  so  kept  are  in  magnificent  preservation, 
appearing  as  if  they" had  just  been  executed,  while  every  one  of 
those  which  have  been  in  the  possession  of  purchasers  and 
exposed  in  frames  are  now  faded  in  proportion  to  the  time  and 
degree  of  their  exposure ;  the  lighter  hues  disappearing,  espe- 
cially from  the  skies,  so  as  sometimes  to  leave  hardly  a  trace  of 
the  cloud-forms.  For  instance,  the  great  Yorkshire  series  is, 
generally  speaking,  merely  the  wreck  of  wdiat  it  once  was.* 
That  water-colors  are  not  injured  by  darkness  is  also  sufficiently 
proved  by  the  exquisite  preservation  of  missal  paintings,  when 
the  books  containing  them  have  been  little  used.  Observe, 
then,  you  have  simply  this  question  to  put  to  the  public  :  "  Will 
you  have  your  Turner  drawings  to  look  at  when  you  are  at 

*  The  cloud-forms  which  have  disappeared  from  the  drawings 
may  be  seen  in  the  engravings. 


1858.]  TURNER    SKETCHES    AND    DRAWINGS.  01 

leisure,  in  a  comfortable  room,  under  such  limitations  as  will 
preserve  them  to  you  forever,  or  will  you  make  an  amusing 
exhibition. of  them  {if  amusing,  which  I  doubt)  for  children 
and  nurserj-maids  ;  dry  your  wet  coats  by  them,  and  shake  otf 
the  dust  from  your  feet  upon  them,  for  a  score  or  two  of  years, 
and  then  send  them  to  the  waste-paper  merchant  V^  That  is  the 
simple  question  ;  answer  it,  for  the  public,  as  you  think  best. 

Permit  me  to  observe  farther,  that  the  small  interest  mani- 
fested in  the  existing  Turner  collection  at  Marlborough  House 
does  not  seem  to  justify  any  further  eifort  at  exhibition. 
There  are  already  more  paintings  and  drawings  placed  in 
those  rooms  than  could  be  examined  properly  in  years  of 
labor.  But  how  placed  \  Thrust  into  dark  corners,  nailed  on 
spare  spaces  of  shutters,  backs  of  doors,  and  tottering  elonga- 
tions of  screens ;  hung  with  their  faces  to  the  light,  or  with 
their  backs  to  the  light,  or  with  their  sides  to  the  light,  so  that 
it  "rakes''  them  (I  use  an  excellent  expression  of  Sir  Charles  East- 
lake's),  throwing  every  irregularity  of  surface  into  view  as  if 
they  were  maps  in  relief  of  hill  countries ;  hung,  in  fine,  in 
every  conceivable  mode  that  can  exhibit  their  faults,  or  conceal 
their  meaning,  or  degrade  their  beauty.  Neither  Mr.  Wornum 
nor  I  are  answerable  for  this ;  w^e  have  both  done  the  best  we 
could  under  the  circumstances  ;  the  public  are  answerable  for  it, 
who  suffer  such  things  without  care  and  without  remonstrance. 
If  they  w^ant  to  derive  real  advantage  from  the  treasures  they 
possess,  let  them  show  some  regard  for  them,  and  build,  or  at  least 
express  some  desire  to  get  built,  a  proper  gallery  for  them.  I 
see  no  WMy  at  present  out  of  the  embarrassments  w^hich  exist 
respecting  the  disposition  of  the  entire  national  collection ; 
but  the  Turner  gallery  was  intended  by  Turner  himself  to  be 
a  distinct  one,  and  there  is  no  reason  w^hy  a  noble  building 
should  not  be  at  once  provided  for  it.  Place  the  oil  pictures  now 
at  Marlborough  Plouse  in  beautiful  rooms,  each  in  a  light  fit 
and  sufficient  for  it,  and  all  on  a  level  with  the  eye ;  range  them 
in  chronological  order;  place  the  sketches  at  present  exhibited, 
also  in  chronological  order,  in  a  lateral  gallery;  let  illustrative 
engravings  and  explanations  be  put  in  cases  near  them  ;  furnish 


92  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1858. 

the  room  richly  and  gracefully,  as  the  Louvre  is  furnished, 
and  I  do  not  tliink  the  public  would  any  longer  complain  of 
not  having  enough  to  amuse  them  on  rainy  days.     . 

That  we  ought  to  do  as  much  for  our  whole  national  col- 
lection is  as  certain  as  that  we  shall  not  do  it  for  many  a  year 
to  come,  nor  until  we  have  wasted  twice  as  much  money  as 
would  do  it  nobly  in  vain  experiments  on  a  moan  scale.  I 
have  no  immediate  hope  in  this  matter,  else  I  might  perhaps 
ask  you  to  let  me  occupy  your  columns  with  some  repetition, 
in  otlier  words  (such  repetition  being  apparently  always  needed 
in  these  talking  days),  of  what  I  have  already  stated  in  the 
Appendix  to  my  Notes  on  the  oil-pictures  ''^  at  Marlborough 
House.  But  I  will  only,  being  as  I  say  hopeless  in  the  matter, 
ask  you  for  room  for  a  single  sentence. 

"If  ever  we  come  to  understand  that  the  function  of  a  picture,  after 
all,  with  respect  to  mankind,  is  not  merely  to  be  bought,  but  to  be  seen,  it 
will  follow  that  a  picture  which  deserves  a  price  deserves  a  place;  and  that 
all  paintings  which  are  worth  keeping,  are  worth,  also,  the  rent  of  so  much 
wall  as  shall  be  necessary  to  show  them  to  the  best  advantage,  and  in  the 
least  fatiguing  way  for  the  spectator. 

"  It  would  be  interesting  if  we  could  obtain  a  return  of  the  sum  which 
the  English  nation  pays  a  nnuallyfor  park  walls  to  inclose  game,  stable 
walls  to  separate  horses,  and  garden  walls  to  ripen  peaches;  and  if  we 
could  compare  this  ascertained  sum  with  what  it  pays  for  walls  to  show  its 
art  upon." 

I  ask  you  to  reprint  this,  because  the  fact  is  that  if  either 
Mr.  Wornum  at  the  N'ational  Gallery,  or  Mr.  Carpenter  at  the 
British  Museum,  had  as  much  well-lighted  wall  at  their  dis- 
posal as  most  gentlemen's  gardeners  have,  they  could  each 
furnish  the  public  with  art  enough  to  keep  them  gazing  from 
one  year's  end  to  another's.  Mr.  Carpenter  has  already  made 
a  gallant  effort  with  some  screens  in  a  dark  room ;  but  in  the 
National  Gallery,  whatever  mode  of  exhibition  may  be  deter- 
mined upon  for  the  four  hundred  framed  drawings,  the  great 
mass  of  the  Turner  sketches  (about  fifteen  thousand,  without 

*  "Notes  on  the  0^7  pictures,"  to  be  distinguished  from  the  later  cata- 
logue of  the  Turner  sketches  and  drawings  with  which  this  letter  directly 
deals.     See  ante,  p.  88,  note. 


1858.]  TURNER    SKETCHES    AND    DRAWINGS.  93 

counting  mere  color  ineinoranda)  must  lie  packed  in  parcels  in 
tin  cases,  simply  for  want  of  room  to  show  them.  It  is  true 
that  many  of  these  are  quite  slight,  and  would  be  interesting 
to  none  but  artists.  There  are,  however,  upwards  of  live 
thousand  sketches  in  pencil  outline,*  which  are  just  as  inte- 
resting as  those  now  exhil)itt'd  at  Marlborough  House;  and 
which  miirht  be  constant Iv  exhibited,  like  those,  without  anv 
harm,  if  there  were  only  walls  to  put  them  on. 

I  have  already  occupied  much  of  your  space.  I  do  not  say 
too  much,  considering  the  importance  of  the  subject,  but  f  I 
must  [with  more  ditiidence]  ask  you  to  allow  me  yet  leave  to 
reply  to  the  objections  you  make  to  two  statements  [and  to  one 
omission]  in  my  Catalogue,  as  those  objections  would  other- 
wise diminish  its  usefulness.  I  have  asserted  that  in  a  given 
drawing  (named  as  one  of  the  chief  in  the  series).  Turner's 
pencil  did  not  move  over  the  thousandth  of  an  inch  without 
meaning ;  and  you  charge  this  expression  with  extravagant 
hyperbole.  On  the  contrary,  it  is  much  within  the  truth, 
being  merely  a  mathematically  accurate  description  of  fairly 
good  execution  in  either  drawing  or  engraving.  It  is  only 
necessary  to  measure  a  piece  of  any  ordinarily  good  work  to 
ascertain  this.  Take,  for  instance,  Finden's  engraving  at  the 
180th   page  of    Rogers'  poems,  :j:  in  which  the  face  of  the 

*  By  the  way,  you  really  ought  to  have  given  me  some  credit 
for  the  swivel  frames  in  the  desks  of  Marlborough  House,  which 
enable  the  public,  however  rough-handed,  to  see  the  drawings  on 
both  sides  of  the  same  leaf.§ 

f  The  rest  of  this  letter  may,  with  the  exception  of  its  two  last  para- 
graphs, and  the  slight  alterations  noted,  be  also  found  in  "The  Two 
Paths,"  Appendix  iv.,  "  Subtlety  of  Hand  "  (pp.  226-9  of  the  new,  and 
pp.  263-6  of  the  original  edition),  where  the  words  bracketed  [sic]  in  this 
reprint  of  it  are,  it  will  be  seen,  oniit'cd. 

t  From  a  vignette  design  by  Stothard  of  a  single  figure,  to  illustrate  tlie 
poem  "  On  a  Tear."    (Rogers'  Poems,  London,  1834  ed.) 

§  The  identical  frames,  each  containing  examples  of  the  sketches  in 
pencil  outline  to  which  the  letter  alludes,  may  be  seen  in  "he  windows  of 
the  lower  rooms  of  the  National  Gallery,  now  devoted  to  the  exhibition  of 
the  Turner  drawings. 


94  LETTERS   ON"    ART.  [1858. 

figure,  from  the  chin  to  the  top  of  the  brow,  occupies  just  a 
quarter  of  an  inch,  and  the  space  between  the  upper  lip  and 
chin  as  nearly  as  possible  one-seventeenth  of  an  inch.  The 
wliole  nioiith  occupies  one-third  of  this  space,  say,  one-fiftieth 
of  an  inch  ;  and  within  that  space  both  the  lips  and  the  much 
more  difiicult  inner  corner  of  the  mouth  are  perfectly  drawn 
and  rounded,  with  quite  successful  and  sufficiently  subtle 
expression.  Any  artist  will  assure  you,  that  in  order  to  draw 
a  mouth  as  well  as  this,  there  must  be  more  than  twenty 
gradations  of  shade  in  the  touches ;  that  is  to  say,  in  this  case, 
gradations  changing,  with  meaning,  within  less  than  the 
thousandth  of  an  inch. 

But  this  is  mere  child's  play  compared  to  the  refinement 
of  any  first-i-ate  mechanical  work,  much  more  of  brush  or 
pencil  drawing  by  a  master's  hand.  In  order  at  once  to  fur- 
nish you  with  authoritative  evidence  on  this  point,  I  w^rote  to 
Mr.  Kingsley,  tutor  of  Sidney-Sussex  College,  a  friend  to 
whom  I  always  have  recourse  when  I  want  to  be  precisely 
right  in  any  matter ;  for  his  great  knowledge  both  of  mathe- 
matics and  of  natural  science  is  joined,  not  only  with  singular 
powers  of  delicate  experimental  manipulation,  but  with  a  keen 
sensitiveness  to  beauty  in  art.  His  answer,  in  its  final  state- 
ment respecting  Turner's  work,  is  amazing  even  to  me ;  and 
will,  I  should  think,  be  more  so  to  your  readers.  Observe  the 
successions  of  measured  and  tested  refinement ;  here  is  No.  1  : 

"  The  finest  mechanical  work  that  I  know  of  is  that  done  by  Nobert  in 
the  way  of  ruling  lines.  I  have  a  series  of  lines  ruled  by  him  on  glass, 
giving  actual  scales  from  .000024  and  .000016  of  an  inch,  perfectly  correct 
to  these  places  of  decimals;  [*]  and  he  has  executed  others  as  fine  as 
.000012,  though  I  do  not  know  how  far  he  could  repeat  these  last  with 
accuracy." 

This  is  'No.   1,  of  precision.     Mr.  Kingsley  proceeds  to 

No.  2 : 

"But  this  is  rude  work  compared  to  the  accuracy  necessary  for  the 
construction  of  the  object-glass  of  a  microscope  such  as  Rosse  turns  out." 

[*  That  is  to  say,  accurate  in  measures  estimated  in  millionths 
of  inches.] 


1858.]  TUKNEll    SKETCHES    AND    DRAWINGS.  95 

I  am  sorry  to  omit  the  explanation  wliicli  follows  of  the 
ten  lenses  composing  such  a  glass,  '-  each  uf  which  must  be 
exact  in  radius  and  in  surface,  and  all  have  their  axes  coin- 
cident ;"  but  it  would  not  be  intelligible  without  tlie  figure  by 
which  it  is  illustrated,  so  I  pass  to  Mr.  Kingsley's  No.  3 : 

"  I  am  tolerably  familiar,"  he  proceeds,  "with  the  actual  grinding  and 
polishing  of  lenses  and  specula,  and  have  produced  by  my  own  hands 
some  by  no  means  bad  optical  work;  and  I  have  copied  no  small  amount 
of  Turner's  work,  and  I  still  look  with  awe  at  the  combined  delicacy  and 
precision  of  his  hand;  it  beats  opiical  itovk  out  of  sight  *  In  optical  work, 
as  in  reliued  drawing,  the  hand  goes  beyond  the  eye,  [f]  and  one  has  to 
depend  upon  the  feel;  and  when  one  has  once  learned  what  a  delicate 
affair  touch  is,  one  gets  a  horror  of  all  coarse  work,  and  is  ready  to  forgive 
any  amount  of  feebleness,  sooner  than  the  boldness  which  is  akin  to  impu- 
dence. In  optics  the  distinction  is  easily  seen  when  the  work  is  put  to 
trial;  but  here  too,  as  in  drawing,  it  requires  an  educated  eye  to  tell  the 
difference  when  the  work  is  only  moderately  bad;  but  with  'bold'  work 
nothing  can  be  seen  but  distortion  and  fog,  and  I  heartily  wish  the  same 
result  would  follow  the  same  kind  of  handling  in  drawing;  but  here,  the 
boldness  cheats  the  unlearned  by  looking  like  the  precision  of  the  true 
man.  It  is  very  strange  how  much  better  our  ears  are  than  our  eyes  in 
this  country:  if  an  ignorant  man  were  to  be  '  bold '  with  a  violin,  he  would 
not  get  many  admirers,  though  his  boldness  was  far  below  that  of  ninety- 
nine  out  of  a  hundred  drawings  one  sees." 

The  words  which  I  have  italicized  X  "^  the  above  extract 
are  those  wdiicli  were  surprising  to  me.  I  knew  that  Turner's 
was  as  refined  as  any  optical  work,  but  had  no  idea  of  its 

[t  In  case  any  of  your  readers  should  question  the  use,  in 
drawing,  of  work  too  fine  for  the  touches  to  be  individually,  I 
quote  a  sentence  from  my  *^  Elements  of  Drawing. "§  ^^  All  fine 
coloring,  like  fine  drawing,  is  delicate;  so  delicate,  that  if  at  last 
you  see  the  color  you  are  putting  on,  you  are  putting  on  too 
much.  You  ought  to  feel  a  change  wrought  in  the  general  tone 
by  touches  which  are  individually  too  pale  to  be  seen."] 

*  Doubly  emphasized  in  "The  Two  Paths,"  where  the  words  arc  printed 
thus:  "  /  still  look  irith  awe  at  the  combined  delicacy  and  precision  of  his  hand; 

IT  BEATS  OPTICAL  WORK  OUT  OF  SIGHT." 

X  "The  Two  Paths"  reprint  has  "put  in  italics." 

§  See  the  "Elements  of  Drawing,"  Letter  III.  on  Color  and  Composi- 
tion, p.  232. 


96  LETTERS   OK   ART.  [1858. 

going  beyond  it.  Mr.  Kingsley's  word  "awe,"  occurring  just 
before,  is,  however,  as  I  have  often  felt,  precisely  the  right  one. 
"When  once  we  begin  at  all  to  understand  the  work  of  any 
truly  great  executor,  such  as  that  of  any  of  the  three  great 
Venetians  [(Tintoret,  Titian,  and  Veronese)],  Correggio,  or 
Turner,  the  awe  of  it  is  something  greater  than  can  be  felt 
from  the  most  stupendous  natural  scenery.  For  the  creation 
of  such  a  system  as  a  high  human  intelligence,  endowed  with 
its  ineffably  perfect  instruments  of  eye  and  hand,  is  a  far 
more  appalling  manifestation  of  Infinite  Power  than  the 
making  either  of  seas  or  mountains.  After  this  testimony  to 
the  completion  of  Turner's  work,  I  need  not  at  length  defend 
myself  from  the  charge  of  hyperbole  in  the  statement  that, 
"  as  far  as  I  know,  the  galleries  of  Europe  may  be  challenged 
to  produce  one  sketch  "*  that  shall  equal  the  chalk  study  No. 
45,  or  the  feeblest  of  the  memoranda  in  the  71st  and  follow- 
ing frames  ;"t  which  memoranda,  however,  it  should  have 
been  observed,  are  stated  at  the  forty-fourth  page  to  be  in 
some  respects  "  the  grandest  work  in  gray  that  he  did  in  his 
life." 

For  I  believe  that,  as  manipulators,  none  but  the  four  men 
whom  1  have  just  named  (the  three  Venetians  and  Correggio) 
were  equal  to  Turner ;  and,  as  far  as  I  know,  none  of  these 
four  men  put  their  full  strength  into  sketches.  But  whether 
they  did  or  not,  my  statement  in  the  Catalogue  is  limited  by 
my  own  knowledge,  and  as  far  as  I  can  trust  that  knowledge : 

*Tlie  following  note  is  here  added  to  the  reprint  in  "  The  Two  Paths:" 
"A  sketch,  observe — not  a  printed  drawing.  Sketches  are  Only  proper 
subjects  of  comparison  with  each  other  when  they  contain  about  the  same 
quantity  of  work:  the  test  of  their  merit  is  the  quantity  of  truth  told  with 
a  given  number  of  touches.  The  assertion  in  the  Catalogue  which  this 
letter  was  written  to  defend  was  made  respecting  the  sketch  of  Rome, 
No.  101." 

f  No.  45  was  a  "  Study  of  a  Cutter."  Mr.  Ruskin's  note  to  it  in  the 
Catalogue  is  partly  as  follows:  "  I  have  never  seen  any  chalk  sketch  which 
for  a  moment  could  be  compared  with  this  for  soul  and  power.  ...  I 
should  think  that  the  power  of  it  would  be  felt  by  most  people;  but  if  not, 
let  those  who  do  not  feel  its  strength,  try  to  copy  it."  -See  the  Catalogue 
under  No.  45,  as  also  under  No.  71,  referred  to  above. 


1858.]  TUKXER    SKKTCHES    AND    DRAWINGS.  97 

it  is  not  an  enthusiastic  statement,  but  an  entirely  calm  and 
considered  one.  It  may  be  a  mistake,  but  it  is  not  an  livner- 
bole. 

Lastly,  you  object  that  the  drawings  for  the  "  L'lher  Shi^ 
diarxim'^  are  not  included  in  my  catalogue.  They  are  not  so, 
because  I  did  not  consider  them  as,  in  a  true  sense,  drawings 
at  all ;  they  are  merely  washes  of  color  laid  roughly  to  guide 
the  mezzotint  engraver  in  his  first  process ;  the  drawing, 
properly  so  called,  was  all  put  in  by  Turner  when  he  etched 
the  plates,  or  superadded  by  repeated  touchings  on  the  pnjofs. 
These  brown  "guides,"  for  they  are  nothing  more,  are  entirely 
unlike  the  painter's  usual  work,  and  in  every  way  inferior  to 
it;  so  that  students  wishing  to  understand  the  composition  of 
the  "  Liber'^^  must  always  work  from  the  ])lates,  and  not  from 
these  first  indications  of  purpose."^  I  have  put  good  impres- 
sions of  two  of  the  plates  in  the  same  room,  in  order  to  show 
their  superiority ;  and  for  the  rest,  thought  it  useless  to  in- 
crease the  bulk  of  the  Catalogue  by  naming  subjects  which 
have  been  published  and  well  known  these  thirty  years. f 

Permit  me,  in  conclusion,  to  thank  you  for  drawing  atten- 
tion to  the  subject  of  this  great  national  collection  ;  and,  again 


*  In  a  letter  to  Mr.  Norton  written  in  the  same  year  as  tliis  one  to  the 
Literary  Gazette,  Mr.  Ruskin  thus  speaks  of  the  vahie  of  these  phites: 
"Even  those  who  know  most  of  art  may  at  first  look  l)e  disappointed  with 
the  Liber  Studiorum.  For  the  nobleness  of  these  designs  is  not  more  in 
what  is  done  than  in  what  is  not  done  in  them.  Every  touch  in  these 
plates  is  related  to  every  other,  and  has  no  permission  of  witiidrawn, 
monastic  virtue,  but  is  only  good  in  its  connection  with  the  rest,  and  in 
that  connection  infinitely  and  inimitably  good.  The  sliowing  how  each  of 
these  designs  is  connected  by  all  manner  of  strange  intellectual  chords  and 
nerves  with  the  patlios  and  hist-ory  of  this  old  English  country  of  ours,  and 
with  the  history  of  European  mind  from  earliest  mythology  down  to 
modern  rationalism  and  irrationalism — all  this  was  what  I  meant  to  try 
and  show  in  my  closing  work;  but  long  before  that  closing  I  felt  it  to  be 
impossible." — E.xtract  from  a  letter  of  Mr.  Ruskin,  1858,  quoted  in  the 
*'  List  of  Turner  Drawings,  etc.,"  already  mentioned,  p.  5. 

fThe  Literary  Gazette  of  November  20,  1858.  contains  a  reply  to  this 
letter,  but  as  it  did  not  provoke  a  further  letter  from  Mr.  Ruskin,  it  is  not 
noticed  in  detail  here. 


98  LETTERS    ON    ART.  [1859. 

asking  your  indulgence  for  trespassing  so  far  upon  your  space, 
to  subscribe  myself, 

Yery  respectfully  yours, 

J.  RiJSKm. 


[From  "  The  Times,"  October  21,  1859.] 

THE  TURNER  GALLERY  AT  E:ENSINGT0N.'^ 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times." 

Sir  :  At  the  time  of  my  departure  for  the  Continent  some 
months  ago  I  had  heard  it  was  proposed  to  light  the  Turner 
Gallery,  at  Kensington,  with  gas ;  but  I  attached  no  impor- 
tance to  the  rumor,  feeling  assured  that  a  commission  would 
be  appointed  on  the  subject,  and  that  its  decision  would  be 
adverse  to  the  mode  of  exhibition  suggested. 

Such  a  commission  has,  I  find,  been  appointed ;  and  has, 
contrary  to  my  expectations,  approved  and  confirmed  the  plan 
of  lighting  proposed. 

It  would  be  the  merest  presumption  in  me  to  expect  weight 
to  Jbe  attached  to  any  opinion  of  mine,  opposed  to  that  of  any 
one  of  the  gentlemen  who  formed  the  commission ;  but  as  I 
was  officially  employed  in  some  of  the  operations  connected 
with  the  arrangement  of  the  Turner  Gallery  at  Marlborough 
House,  and  as  it  might  therefore  be  supposed  by  the  public 
that  I  at  least  concurred  in  recommending  the  measures  now 
taken  for  exhibition  of  the  Turner  pictures  in  the  evening,  at 
Kensington,  I  must  beg  your  permission  to  state  in  your 
columns  that  I  take  no  share  in  the  responsibility  of  lighting 
the  pictures  either  of  Reynolds  or  Turner  with  gas ;  that,  on 

*  There  was  at  the  date  of  this  and  the  following  letter  an  exhibition  of 
Turner  drawings  at  the  South  Kensington  Museum.  These  pictures  have, 
however,  been  since  removed  to  the  National  Gallery,  and  the  only  works 
of  Turner  now  at  Kensington,  are  some  half  a  dozen  oil  paintings  belong- 
ing to  the  Sheepshanks  collection,  and  about  the  same  number  of  water- 
color  drawings,  which  form  part  of  the  historical  series  of  British  water- 
color  paintings. 


1859.]  TURNER   GALLERY   AT   KENSINGTON.  99 

the  contrary,  my  experiencce  would  k'ud  me  to  ai)preliend 
serious  injury  to  those  pictures  from  such  :i  measure;  and  that 
it  is  witli  profound  regret  that  I  have  heard  of  its  adoption. 

I  specify  the  pictures  of  Reynokls  and  Turner,  because 
the  combinations  of  coloring  material  employed  by  both  these 
painters  are  various,  and  to  some  extent  unknown  ;  and  also 
because  the  body  of  their  colors  shows  peculiar  liability  to 
crack,  and  to  detach  itself  from  the  canvas.  I  am  glad  to  be 
able  to  bear  testimony  to  the  fitness  of  the  gallery  at  Kensing- 
ton, as  far  as  could  be  expected  under  the  circumstances,  for 
the  exhibition  of  the  Turner  pictures  by  daylight,  as  well  as  to 
the  excellence  of  Mr.  Wornum's  chronological  arrangement  of 
them  in  the  three  principal  rooms. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.    ItrSKIN. 

Den^iark  Hill,  Oct.  20. 

P.S. — I  wish  the  writer  of  the  admirable  and  exhaustive 
letter  which  appeared  in  your  columns  of  yesterday  on  the 
subject  of  Mr.  Scott's  design  for  the  Foreign  Office  would 
allow  me  to  know  his  name.* 

*  This  refers  to  a  letter  signed  "E.  A.  F."  which  appeared  in  The  Times 
of  October  19,  1859,  advising  the  adoption  of  Mr.  Gilbert  Scott's  Gothic 
design  for  the  Foreign  Office  in  preference  to  any  Classic  design.  The 
writer  entered  at  some  length  into  the  principles  of  Gothic  and  Cla.ssic 
architecture,  which  he  briefly  summed  up  in  the  last  sentence  of  his  letter: 
"Gothic,  then,  is  national;  it  is  constructively  real;  it  is  equally  adapted 
to  all  sorts  of  buildings;  it  is  convenient;  it  is  cheap.  In  none  of  these 
does  Italian  surpass  it;  in  most  of  them  it  is  very  inferior  to  it."  See  the 
letters  on  the  Oxford  Muscimi  as  to  the  adaptability  of  Gothic — included  in 
Section  vi.  of  these  Letters  on  Art.  With  regard  to  the  cheapness  of 
Gothic,  the  correspondent  of  The  Times*  had  pointed  out  that  while  it  may 
be  cheap  and  yet  thoroughly  good  so  far  as  it  goes,  Italian  inu»t  always  bo 
costly. 


100  LETTEKS   OK   ART.  [1876. 


LFrom  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  JiUy  5,  1876.] 

TURNERS  DBAWINOS. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sm :  I  am  very  heartily  glad  to  see  the  subject  of  Turner's 
drawings  brought  more  definitely  before  the  public  in  your 
remarks  on  the  recent  debate  ^  in  Parliament.  It  is  indeed 
highly  desirable  that  these  drawings  should  be  made  more 
accessible,  and  I  will  answer  your  reference  to  me  by  putting 
you  in  possession  of  all  the  facts  which  it  is  needful  that  the 
public  should  know^  or  take  into  consideration  respecting  them, 
in  either  judging  what  has  been  hitherto  done  by  those  en- 
trusted with  their  care,  or  taking  measures  for  obtaining  greater 
freedom  in  their  use.  Their  use,  I  say,  as  distinguished  from 
the  mere  pleasure  of  seeing  them.  This  pleasure,  to  the 
general  public,  is  very  small  indeed.  You  appear  not  to  be 
aware  that  three  hundred  of  the  finest  examples,  including  all 
the  originals  of  the  Liber  Studiorum,  were  framed  by  myself, 
especially  for  the  public,  in  the  year  1858,  and  have  been 
exhibited  every  day,  and  all  day  long,  ever  since  in  London. 
But  the  public  never  stops  a  moment  in  the  room  at  Kensing- 
ton where  they  hang  ;  and  the  damp,  filth,  and  gas  (under  tlie 
former  management  of  that  institution  )f  soiled  their  frames 
and  warped  the  drawings,  "  by  friend  remembered  not." 

f  Now  I  trust,  under  Mr.  Poynter  and  Mr.  Sparkes,  under- 
going thorough  reform.  I 

*  Hardly  a  debate.  Lord  Francis  Hervey  had  recently  (June  30,  1876) 
put  a  question  in  the  House  of  Commons  to  Lord  Henry  Lennox  (First 
Commissioner  of  Works)  as  to  whether  it  was  the  fact  that  many  of  Turner's 
drawings  were  at  that  time  stowed  in  the  cellars  of  the  National  Gallery, 
and  had  never  been  exhibited.  I'he  Daily  Telegraph  in  a  short  article  on 
the  matter  (July  1,  1876)  appealed  to  Mr.  Ruskin  for  his  opinion  on  the 
exhibition  of  these  drawings. 

I  Mr.  Poynter,  R.  A.,  was  then,  as  now.  Director,  and  Mr.  Sparkes  Head 
Master,  of  the  Art  School  at  the  South  Kensington  Museum. 


1876. J  turner's  drawings.  101 

You  have  been  also  inisiiiforined  in  supposing  tliat  '-fcr 
some  years  these  acjuarelles  were  unreservedly  shown,  and  in  all 
the  fulness  of  daylight."  Only  the  "  Seine"  series  (rivers  of 
France),  the  rivers  of  England,  the  harbors  of  England,  and 
the  Rogers'  vignettes  (about  a  hundred  drawings  in  all),  were 
exhibited  in  the  dark  under-rooni  of  Marlborough  House,  and 
a  few  larger  and  smaller  examples  scattered  up  and  down  in 
the  room  of  the  National  Gallery,  including  Fort  Bard,  Edin- 
burgh, and  Ivy  Bridge.*  These  draw^ings  are  all  finished,  most 
of  them  have  been  engraved  ;  they  were  shown  as  the  choicest 
of  the  collection,  and  there  is  no  question  but  that  they  should 
always  be  perfectly  accessible  to  the  public.  There  are  no 
other  finished  drawings  in  the  vast  mass  of  the  remaining 
material  for  exhibition  and  means  of  education.  But  these  are 
all  the  drawings  which  Turner  made  during  liis  lifetime,  in 
color,  chalk,  pencil,  and  ink,  for  his  own  study  or  delight ;  that 
is  to  say,  pencil  sketches  to  be  counted  by  the  thousand  (how 
many  thousands  I  cannot  safely  so  much  as  guess),  and  assuredly 
upwards  of  two  thousand  colored  studies,  many  of  exquisite 
beauty ;  and  all  instructive  as  no  other  water-color  work  ever 
was  before,  or  has  been  since ;  besides  the  ink  and  clialk  studies 
for  all  his  great  Academy  pictures. f 

There  are  in  this  accumulation  of  drawings  means  of  educa- 
tion in  the  noblest  principles  of  elementary  art  and  in  the  most 
accomplished  science  of  color  for  every  drawing-school  in 
England,  were  they  properly  distributed.  Besides  these,  there 
are  the  three  hundred  chosen  drawings  already  named,  now  at 
Kensington,  and  about  two  hundred  more  of  equal  value,  now 
in  the  lower  rooms  of  the  National  Gallery,  which  the  Trustees 
permitted  me  to  choose  out  of  the  mass,  and  frame  for  general 
service. 

*For  notes  of  these  drawings  see  the  Catalogue  of  the  Turner  Sketches 
and  Drawings  already  mentioned— (^0  The  Battle  of  Fort  Bard.  Val  d'Aosta, 
p.  32;  {b)  the  Edinburgh,  p.  30;  and  (c)  the  Ivy  Bridge.  Devon,  p.  32. 

1 1  have  omitted  to  add  to  my  note  (p.  84)  on  Mr.  Rusk  in 's  arrangement 
of  the  Turner  drawings  a  reference  to  his  own  account  of  the  labor  wliuli 
that  arrangement  involved,  and  of  the  condition  in  which  he  found  the  vast 
mass  of  the  sketches.     See  "  Modern  Pamters,"  vol.  v.,  Preface,  p.  vi. 


102  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1876. 

Thej  are  framed  as  I  frame  exercise-drawings  at  Oxford,  for 

my  own  scliools.  They  are,  when  in  use,  perfectly  secure  from 
dust  and  all  other  sources  of  injury  ;  slide,  when  done  with, 
into  portable  cabinets ;  are  never  exposed  to  light,  but  when 
they  are  being  really  looked  at ;  and  can  be  examined  at  his 
ease,  measured,  turned  in  whatever  light  he  likes,  by  every 
student  or  amateur  who  takes  the  smallest  interest  in  them. 
But  it  is  necessary,  for  this  mode  of  exhibition,  that  there 
sliould  be  trustworthy  persons  in  charge  of  the  drawings,  as  of 
the  MSS.  in  the  British  Museum,  and  that  there  should  be 
attendants  in  observation,  as  in  the  Print  Boom  of  the  Museum, 
that  glasses  may  not  be  broken,  or  drawings  taken  out  of  the 
frames. 

Thus  taken  care  of,  and  thus  shown,  the  drawings  may  be  a 
quite  priceless  possession  to  the  people  of  England  for  the  next 
five  centuries;  whereas  those  exliibited  in  the  Manchester 
Exhibition  were  virtually  destroyed  in  that  single  summer.* 
There  is  not  one  of  them  but  is  the  mere  wreck  of  what  it 
was.  I  do  not  choose  to  name  destroyed  drawings  in  the 
possession  of  others  ;  but  I  will  name  the  vignette  of  the  Plains 
of  Troy  in  my  own,  which  had  half  the  sky  baked  out  of  it  in 
that  fatal  year,  and  the  three  drawings  of  Bichmond  (York- 
shire), Egglestone  Abbey,  and  Langhame  Castle,t  which  have 
had  by  former  exposure  to  light  their  rose-colors  entirely 
destroyed,  and  half  of  their  blues,  leaving  nothing  safe  but  the 
brown. 

*  The  Art  Treasures  Exhibition  in  1857,  being  the  year  in  which  the 
lectures  contained  in  the  ''Political  Economy  of  Art"  were  delivered.  (!See 
"A  Joy  for  Ever"— Raskin's  Works,  vol.  xi.  p.  80.) 

f'The  Plains  of  Troy;"— see  for  a  note  of  this  drawing  Mr.  Ruskin's 
Notes  on  his  own  "Turners,"  1878,  p.  45,  where  he  describes  it  as  "one  of 
the  most  elaborate  of  the  Byron  vignettes,  and  full  of  beauty,"  adding  that 
"the  meaning  of  the  sunset  contending  with  the  storm  is  the  contest  of  the 
powers  of  Apollo  and  Athene;"  and  for  the  engraving  of  it,  see  Murray's 
edition  of  Byron's  Life  and  Works  (1833,  seventeen  volumes),  where  it 
forms  the  vignette  title-page  of  vol.  vii.  For  the  Richmond  and  the  Eggle- 
stone Abbey,  also  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Ruskin,  see  the  above-mentioned 
Notes,  p.  29  (Nos.  26  and  27).  The  Langliarne  Castle  was  formerly  in  the 
possession  of  Mr.  W.  M.  Bigg,  at  the  sale  of  whose  collection  in  1868  it  was 
sold  for  £451. 


1876.]  turner's  drawings.  103 

I  do  not  think  it  necessary  to  repeat  my  former  statements 
respecting  the  injnriuns  power  of  liglit  on  certain  ])igments 
rapidly,  and  on  all  eventually.  The  respective  keepers  of  the 
Print  Room  and  of  the  Manuscripts  in  the  British  Museum  are 
the  2)roper  persons  to  be  consulted  on  tliat  matter,  tlieir  expe- 
rience being  far  larger  than  mine,  and  over  longer  epochs.  I 
will,  however,  myself  nndertake  to  show  from  my  own  collec- 
tion a  water-color  of  the  eleventh  century  al)Solutely  as  fresh  as 
when  it  was  laid — having  been  guarded  from  light ;  and  water- 
color  burnt  by  sunlight  into  a  mere  dirty  stain  on  the  paper, 
in  a  year,  with  the  matched  piece  from  which  it  was  cut  beside 
it. 

The  public  may,  therefore,  at  their  pleasure  treat  their 
Turner  drawings  as  a  large  exhibition  of  fireworks,  see  them 
explode,  clap  tlieir  hands,  and  have  done  with  them  ;  or  they 
may  treat  them  as  an  exhaustless  library  of  noble  learning. 
To  this  end,  they  need,  first,  space  and  2)roper  light — north 
light,  as  clear  of  smoke  as  possible,  and  large  windows ;  and 
then  proj)er  attendance — that  is  to  say,  well-paid  librarians  and 
servants. 

The  space  will  of  course  be  difficult  to  obtain,  for  while 
the  British  public  of  the  upper  classes  are  always  ready  to  pay 
any  money  whatever  for  space  to  please  their  pride  in  their 
own  dining-rooms  and  ball-rooms,  they  would  not,  most  of 
them,  give  five  shillings  a  year  to  get  a  good  room  in  the 
National  Gallery  to  show  the  national  drawings  in.  As  to  the 
room  in  which  it  is  at  present  proposed  to  place  them  in  tlie 
new  building,  they  might  just  as  well,  for  any  good  that  will 
ever  be  got  out  of  them  there,  be  exhibited  in  a  railway  tunnel. 

And  the  attendants  will  also  be  difficult  to  obtain.  For— 
and  this  is  the  final  fact  to  which  I  beg  your  notice — these 
drawings  now  in  rpiestion  were,  as  I  above  stated,  framed  by 
me  in  1858.  They  have  been  perfectly  "accessible''  ever 
since,  and  are  so  now,  as  easily  as  any  works  *  in  the  shops  of 
Eegent  Street  are  accessible  over  the  counter,  if  you  have  got 

*  A  misprint  for  "  ^varcs;  "  sec  next  letter,  p.  104. 


104  LETTEKS   Oi^  ART.  [1876. 

a  shopman  to  hand  them  to  you.  And  tlie  British  public 
have  been  whining  and  growhng  about  their  exchision  from 
the  sight  of  these  drawings  for  the  last  eighteen  years,  simply 
because,  while  they  are  willing  to  pay  for  any  quantity  of 
sentinels  to  stand  in  boxes  about  town  and  country,  for  any 
quantity  of  flunkeys  to  stand  on  boards  for  additional  weight 
to  carriage  horses,  and  for  any  quantity  of  footmen  to  pour 
out  their  wine  and  chop  up  their  meat  for  them,  they  would 
not  for  all  these  eighteen  years  pay  so  much  as  a  single  attend- 
ant to  hand  them  the  Turner  drawings  across  the  [N'ational 
Gallery  table  ;  but  only  what  was  needful  to  obtain  for  two 
days  in  the  week  tlie  withdrawal  from  his  other  duties  in  the 
Gallery  of  the  old  servant  of  Mr.  Samuel  Rogers. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.  EUSKIN. 

Brantwood,  July  3. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  July  19,  ISTG.] 

TURNER'S  DRAWINGS. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir  :  In  justice  to  our  living  water-color  artists,  will  you 
favor  me  by  printing  the  accompanying  letter,"^  which  I  think 
will  be  satisfactory  to  many  of  your  readers,  on  points  respect- 
ing which  my  own  may  have  given  some  of  them  a  false 
impression  ?  In  my  former  letter,  permit  me  to  correct  the 
misprint  of  "  works"  in  Regent  Street  for  "  wares." 

*  Addressed  to  Mr.  Ruskin  by  Mr.  Collingwood  Smith,  and  requesting 
Mr.  Ruskin  to  state  in  a  second  letter  that  the  remarks  as  to  the  effe-ct  of 
light  on  the  water-colors  of  Turner  did  not  extend  to  water-color  drawings 
in  general;  but  that  the  evanescence  of  the  colors  in  Turner's  drawings  was 
due  partly  to  the  peculiar  vehicles  with  which  lie  painted,  and  partly  to  the 
gray  paper  (saturated  with  indigo)  on  which  he  frequently  worked.  Mr. 
Ruskin  complied  with  this  request  by  thus  forwarding  for  publication  Mr. 
Collingwood  Smith's  letter. 


1876.]  COPIES   OF   turner's   DRAWINGS.  105 

I  have  every  reason  to  suppose  Mr.  Collingwood  Smitirs 
knowledge  of  the  subject  entirely  trustworthy ;  but  when  all 
is  conceded,  must  still  repeat  that  no  water-color  work  of  value 
should  ever  be  constantly  exposed  to  light,  or  even  to  the  air 
of  a  crowded  metropolis,  least  of  all  to  gaslight  or  its  fumes. 

I  am,  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

J.  KUSKIN. 
Brantwood,  Coniston,  Lancashire,  July  16. 


[From  "  The  Times,"  April  25,  1876.] 

COPIES   OF  TURNERS  DRAWINOS. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times." 

Sir  :  You  will  oblige  me  by  correcting  the  misstatement 
in  your  columns  of  the  22d,^  that  ''  only  copies  of  the  copies" 
of  Turner  exhibited  at  148  IS^ew  Bond  Street,  are  for  sale. 
The  drawings  offered  for  sale  by  the  company  will,  of  course, 
be  always  made  by  Mr,  Ward  from  the  originals,  just  as  much 
as  those  now  exhibited  as  specimens. 

*  The  references  to  The  Times  allude  to  an  article  on  the  "Copies  of 
Turner  Drawings,"  by  Mr.  William  Ward,  of  2  Church  Terrace,  Rich- 
mond, Surrey,  which  were  then,  as  now,  exhibited  for  sale  in  the  rooms  of 
the  Fine  Art  Society. 

Of  these  copies  of  Turner,  Mr.  Ruskin  says:  "  They  are  executed  with 
extreme  care  under  my  own  eye  by  the  draughtsman  trained  by  me  for  the 
purpose,  Mr.  Ward.  Everything  that  can  be  learned  from  the  smaller 
works  of  Turner  may  be  as  securely  learned  from  these  drawings.  I  liave 
been  more  than  once  in  doubt,  seeing  original  and  copy  together,  which 
was  which;  and  I  think  them  about  the  best  works  that  can  now  be 
obtained  for  a  moderate  price,  representing  the  authoritative  forms  of  art 
in  landscape." — Extract  from  letter  of  Mr.  Ruskin,  written  in  1867.  List 
of  Turner  Drawings,  etc.,  shown  in  connection  with  Mr.  Norton's  lectures. 
Boston,  1874,  p.  9.     (See  also  "  Ariadne  Florentina,"  p.  221,  note.) 

The  following  comment  of  Mr.  Ruskin  on  one  of  Mr.  Ward's  most 
recent  copies  is  also  interesting  as  evidence  that  the  opinions  cxprcs.sed  in 
this  letter  are  still  retained  by  its  writer:  "London,  20th  >Iarch.  1880.— 
The  copy  of  Turner's  drawing  of  *  Fluclen,'  which  has  been  just  completed 


106  LETTERS   OK   AKT.  [1871. 

You  observe  in  the  course  of  your  article  that  "  surely  such 
attempts  could  not  gratify  any  one  who  had  a  true. insight  for 
Mr.  Turner's  works  ?"  But  the  reason  that  the  drawings  now 
at  148  Kew  Bond  Street  are  not  for  sale  is  that  they  do  gratify 
me^  and  are  among  my  extremely  valued  possessions ;  and  if 
among  the  art  critics  on  your  staff  there  be,  indeed,  any  one 
whose  "  insight  for  Mr.  Turner's  work"  you  suppose  to  be 
greater  than  mine,  I  shall  have  much  pleasure  in  receiving  any 
instructions  with  w^liich  he  may  favor  me,  at  the  National 
Gallery,  on  the  points  either  in  which  Mr.  Ward's  work  may 
be  im23roved,  or  on  those  in  which  Turner  is  so  superior  to 
Titian  and  Correggio,  that  while  the  public  maintain,  in  Italy,  a 
nation  of  copyists  of  these  second-rate  masters,  they  are  not 
justified  in  hoping  any  success  whatever  in  representing  the 
w^ork  of  the  Londoner,  whom,  while  he  was  alive,  I  was  always 
called  mad  for  praising. 

I  am.  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

John  Russm. 
Peterborough,  A-gril  23. 


[From  "  The  Times,"  January  24,  1871.] 

"TURNERS;'  FALSE  AND   TRUE. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times." 

Sir:    I    have   refused  until  now  to  express  any  opinion 
respecting  the  picture  N'o.  40  ^  in  the  Exhibition  of  the  Old 

by  Mr.  Ward,  and  shown  to  me  to-day,  is  beyond  my  best  hopes  in  every 
desirable  quality  of  execution;  and  is  certainly  as  good  as  it  is  possible  for 
care  and  skill  to  make  it.  I  am  so  entirely  satisfied  with  it  that,  for  my 
own  personal  2'>l<^asure — irrespective  of  pride,  I  should  feel  scarcely  any  loss 
in  taking  it  home  with  me  instead  of  the  original;  and  for  all  uses  of  artistic 
example  or  instruction,  it  is  absolutely  as  good  as  the  original. — John  Rus- 
KiN." — The  copy  in  question  is  from  a  drawing  in  the  possession  of  Mr. 
Ruskin  (see  the  Turner  Notes,  1878,  No.  70),  and  was  executed  for  its 
present  proprietor,  Mr.  T.  S.  Kennedy,  of  Meanwoods,  Leeds. 

*  "Italy,"  a  reputed  Turner,  lent  by  the  late  Mr.  Wynn  Ellis.     No.  235 
was  "A  Landscape,"  with  Cattle,  in  the  possession  of  Lord  Leconfield. 


1857.]  THE   CHARACTER   OF   TURNER.  107 

Masters,  feeling  extreme  reluctance  to  say  anything  wliicli  its 
kind  owner,  to  whom  the  Exhibition  owes  so  much,  might 
deem  discourteous. 

But  I  did  not  suppose  it  was  possible  any  doubt  could  lono* 
exist  among  artists  as  to  the  character  of  the  work  in  question ; 
and,  as  I  find  its  authenticity  still  in  some  quarters  maintained, 
1  think  no  other  course  is  open  to  me  than  to  state  that  the 
picture  is  not  by  Turner,  nor  even  by  an  imitator  of  Turner 
acquainted  with  the  essential  qualities  of  the  master. 

I  am  able  to  assert  this  on  internal  evidence  only.  I  never 
saw  the  picture  before,  nor  do  I  know  anything  of  the  channels 
through  which  it  came  into  the  possession  of  its  present  pro- 
prietor. 

1^0.  235  is,  on  the  contrary,  one  of  the  most  consummate 
and  majestic  works  that  ever  came  irom  the  artist's  hand,  and 
it  is  one  of  the  very  few  now  remaining  which  have  not  been 
injured  by  subsequent  treatment. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  seiwant, 

John  Euskin. 
Denmark  Hill,  Ja?i.  23. 


CFrom  "The  Life  of  Tvimer,"  by  Walter  Thombury.] 
TEB  CHARACTER   OF  TURNER* 

[The  following  admonition,  sent  by  Mr.  Ruskin  in  1857  to  Mr. 
Thornbury,  and  coupled  witli  the  advice  that  for  the  biographer 
of  Turner  there  was  no  time  to  be  lost,  '*  for  those  wlio  knew 
him  when  young  are  dying  daily,"  forms  a  fit  conclusion  to  this 
division  of  the  letters.] 

*  See  also  "M(xlcrn  Painters,"  vol.  v.  pp.  345-347,  and  "Lectures  on 
Architecture  and  Painting,"  pp.  181-188,  where  the  character  of  Turner  is 
further  explained,  and  various  anecdotes  given  in  special  illustration  of  his 
truth,  generosity,  and  kindness  of  heart. 


108  LETTERS   ON^  ART.  [1857. 

Fix  at  the  beffinnino:  the  f  olio  win  o:  main  characteristics  of 
Turner  in  your  mind,  as  the  keys  to  the  secret  of  all  he  said 

and  did  • 

Uprightness, 

Generosity. 

Tenderness  of  heart  (extreme). 

Sensuality. 

Obstinacy  (extreme). 

Irritability 

Infidelity. 

And  be  sure  that  he  knew  his  own  power,  and  felt  himself 
utterly  alone  in  the  world  from  its  not  being  understood. 
Don't  try  to  mask  the  dark  side.     .     .     . 

Yours  most  truly, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

[See  the  preface  to  the  first  edition  of  the  '^  Life  of  Turner;" 
that  to  the  second  contains  the  following  estimate  of  Mr.  Thorn- 
bary's  book:*  ^'Lucerne,  Dec.  2,  1861. — I  have  just  received 
and  am  reading  your  book  with  deep  interest.  I  am  much  grati- 
fied by  the  view  you  have  taken  and  give  of  Turner.  It  is  quite 
what  I  hoped.  What  beautiful  things  you  have  discovered  about 
him!  Thank  you  for  your  courteous  and  far  too  flattering  refer- 
ences to  me."] 

*  The  book  was  also  referred  to  in  "  Modern  Painters,"  vol.  v.  p.  344, 
where  Mr.  Ruskin  speaks  of  this  "  Life  of  Turner,"  then  still  unpublished, 
as  being  written  "by  a  biographer,  who  will,  1  believe,  spare  no  pains  in 
collecting  the  few  scattered  records  which  exist  of  a  career  so  uneventful 
and  secluded." 


LETTERS   ON  ART. 


V. 

PICTUEES  AND  ARTISTS. 

John  Leech's  Outlines.     1872. 

Ernest  George's   Etchings.     1873. 

The  FliEDERiCK  Walker  Exhibition.     1876. 


PICTURES  AKD  ARTISTS. 


[From  tlie  "Catalogue  of  tlie  Exhibition  of  Outlines  by  the  late  John  Leech,  at  the 
Gallery,  9  Conduit  Street,  Regent  Street."    187:2.*] 


JOHN  LEECirS  OUTLINES. 

I  AM  honored  by  the  request  of  the  sister  of  John  Leech 
that  I  should  give  some  account  of  the  drawings  of  her  brother, 
which  remain  in  her  possession ;  and  I  am  able  to  fulfil  her 
request  without  departing  from  the  rule  which  has  always 
bound  me,  not  to  allow  any  private  interest  to  weigh  with  me 
in  s])eaking  of  matters  which  concern  the  public.  It  is  merely 
and  simply  a  matter  of  public  concern  that  the  value  of  these 
drawings  should  be  known  and  measures  taken  for  their  acqui- 
sition, or,  at  least,  for  obtaining  a  characteristic  selection  from 
them,  as  a  National  property.  It  cannot  be  necessary  for  me, 
or  for  any  one,  now  to  praise  the  work  of  John  Leech.  xVdmit- 
tedly  it  contains  the  finest  definition  and  natural  history  of  the 
classes  of  our  society,  the  kindest  and  subtlest  analysis  of  its 
foibles,  the  tenderest  flattery  of  its  pretty  and  well-bred  ways, 
with  which  the  modesty  of  subservient  genius  ever  amused  or 
immortalized  careless  masters.  But  it  is  not  generally  known 
how  much  more  valuable,  as  art,  the  first  sketches  for  the 
woodcuts  were  than  the  finished  drawings,  even  before  those 
drawings  sustained  any  loss  in  engraving. 

John  Leech  was  an  absolute  master  of  the  elements  of 
character, — but  not  by  any  means  of  those  of  chiaroscuro^ — 
and  the  admirableness  of  his  work  diminished  as  it  became 
elaborate.     The  first  few  lines  in  which  he  sets  down  his  pur- 

*  Nearly  eight  years  after  Leech's  deatli  on  October  29,  1864. 


112  LETTERS  ON   ART.  [1872. 

pose  are  invariably  of  all  drawing  that  I  know  the  most  won- 
derful in  their  accurate  felicity  and  prosperous  haste.  It  is 
true  that  the  best  possible  drawing,  whether  slight  or  elabo- 
rate, is  never  hurried.  Holbein  or  Titian,  if  they  lay  only  a 
couple  of  lines,  yet  lay  them  quietly,  and  leave  them  entirely 
right.     But  it  needs  a  certain  sternness  of  temper  to  do  this. 

Most,  in  the  prettiest  sense  of  the  word,  gentle  artists 
indulge  themselves  in  the  ease,  and  even  trust  to  the  felicity 
of  rapid — and  even  in  a  measure  inconsiderate — work  in  sketch- 
ing, so  that  the  beauty  of  a  sketch  is  understood  to  be  consist- 
ent with  what  is  partly  unintentional. 

There  is,  however,  one  condition  of  extreme  and  exquisite 
skill  in  which  haste  may  become  unerring.  It  cannot  be 
obtained  in  completely  finished  work  ;  but  the  hands  of  Gains- 
borough, Reynolds,  or  Tintoret  often  nearly  approach  comple- 
tion at  full  speed,  and  the  pencil  sketches  of  Turner  are 
expressive  almost  in  the  direct  ratio  of  their  rapidity. 

But  of  all  rapid  and  condensed  realization  ever  accom- 
plished by  the  pencil,  John  Leech's  is  the  most  dainty,  and  the 
least  fallible,  in  the  subjects  of  which  he  was  cognizant.  Not 
merely  right  in  the  traits  which  he  seizes,  but  refined  in  the 
sacrifice  of  what  he  refuses. 

The  drawing  becomes  slight  through  fastidiousness  not 
indolence,  and  the  finest  discretion  has  left  its  touches  rare. 

In  flexibility  and  lightness  of  pencilling,  nothing  but  the 
best  outlines  of  Italian  masters  with  the  silver  point  can  be 
compared  to  them.  That  Leech  sketched  English  squires  in- 
stead of  saints,  and  their  daughters  instead  of  martyrs,  does  not 
in  the  least  aifect  the  question  respecting  skill  of  pencilling ; 
and  I  repeat  deliberately  that  nothing  but  the  best  work  of 
sixteenth  century  Italy  with  the  silver  point  exists  in  art, 
which  in  rapid  refinement  these  playful  English  drawings  do 
not  excel.  There  are  too  many  of  them  (fortunately)  to  be 
rightly  exemplary — I  want  to  see  the  collection  divided,  dated 
carefully,  and  selected  portions  placed  in  good  light,  in  a  quite 
permanent  arrangement  in  each  of  our  great  towns  in  connec- 
tion with  their  drawing  schools. 


1873.]  ERNEST    GEORGE'S    ETCHINGS.  113 

I  will  not  indeed  have  any  in  Oxford  %vliile  I  am  there,  be- 
cause I  am  afraid  that  mj  pupils  should  think  too  lightly  of 
their  drawing  as  compared  with  their  other  studies,  and  I  doubt 
their  studying  anything  else  but  John  Leech  if  they  had  him 
to  study.  Ihit  in  our  servile  schools  of  mechanical  drawing,  to 
see  wliat  drawing  was  indeed,  which  could  represent  something 
better  than  machines,  and  could  not  be  mimicked  by  any 
nuichinery,  would  ])ut  more  life  into  them  than  any  other 
teaching  I  can  conceive. 

It  is,  therefore,  with  the  greatest  pleasure  that  I  accept  the 
honor  of  having  my  name  placed  on  the  committee  for  obtain- 
ing funds  for  the  purchase  of  these  drawings  ;  and  I  trust  that 
the  respect  of  the  English  public  for  the  gentle  character  of 
the  master,  and  their  gratitude  for  the  amusement  with  which 
he  has  brightened  so  nuyiy  of  their  days,  will  be  expressed  in 
the  only  way  in  which  expression  is  yet  possible  by  due  care 
and  wise  use  of  the  precious  possessions  he  has  left  to  them. 

(Signed)  J.  Euskin. 


[Frona  "  The  Architect,"  December  27, 1873.] 

ERNEST  GEORGES  ETCHINGS. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Architect." 

My  dear  Sir  :  I  am  entirely  glad  you  had  permission  to 
publish  some  of  Mr.  Ernest  George's  etchings  ;  *  they  are  the 
most  precious  pieces  of  work  I  have  seen  for  many  a  day, 
though  they  are  still,  like  nearly  everything  the  English  do 

*The  number  of  the  Architect  in  which  this  letter  was  printed  contained 
two  sketches  from  Mr.  George's  "Etchings  on  the  Mosel " — those,  viz.,  of 
the  Elector's  Palace,  Coblentz,  and  of  the  interior  of  Metz  Cathedral.  The 
intention  of  the  Architect  to  reproduce  these  etchings  had  apparently  been 
previously  communicated  to  ^Ir.  Iluskin,  who  wrote  the  present  letter  for 
the  issue  in  which  the  etchings  were  to  be  given.  Mr.  George  has  since 
published  other  works  of  the  same  kind — e.r/.,  "  Etchings  iu  Belgium. " 
"  Etchings  on  the  Loire"  (see  Mr.  Kuskiu's  advice  to  him  at  the  end  of  this 
letter,  p.  116). 


114  LETTERS   ON    ART.  [1873. 

best  in  art,  fanltful  in  matters  wliicli  might  have  been  easily 
conquered,  and  not  a  little  wasteful,  sometimes  of  means  and 
time ;  I  should  be  glad,  therefore,  of  space  enough  in  your 
columns  to  state,  with  reference  to  these  sketches,  some  of  the 
principles  of  etching  which  I  had  not  time  to  define  in  the 
lectures  on  engraving  I  gave  this  year,  at  Oxford,^  and  which 
are  too  often  forgotten  even  by  our  best  draughtsmen. 

I  call  Mr.  George's  work  precious,  chiefly  because  it  indi- 
cates an  intense  perception  of  points  of  character  in  architec- 
ture, and  a  sincere  enjoyment  of  them  for  their  own  sake. 
His  drawings  are  not  accumulative  of  material  for  future  use ; 
still  less  are  they  vain  exhibitions  of  his  own  skill.  He  draws 
the  scene  in  all  its  true  relations,  because  it  delights  him,  and 
he  perceives  what  is  permanently  and  altogether  characteristic 
in  it.  As  opposed  to  such  frank  and  j(f)^f ul  work,  most  modern 
architectural  drawings  are  mere  diagi-am  or  exercise. 

I  call  them  precious,  in  the  second  place,  because  they  show 
very  great  powers  of  true  composition.  All  their  subjects  are 
made  delightful  more  by  skill  of  arrangement  than  by  any 
dexterities  of  execution  ;  and  this  faculty  is  very  rare  amongst 
landscape  painters  and  architects,  because  nearly  every  man 
who  has  any  glimmering  of  it  naturally  takes  to  figure  paint- 
ing— not  that  the  ambition  to  paint  figures  is  any  sign  of  the 
faculty,  but  that,  when  people  have  the  faculty,  they  nearly 
always  have  also  the  ambition.  And,  indeed,  this  is  quite 
right,  if  they  would  not  forsake  their  architecture  afterwards, 
but  apply  their  power  of  figure  design,  when  gained,  to  the 
decoration  of  their  buildings. 

To  return  to  Mr.  George's  work.  It  is  precious,  lastly,  in 
its  fine  sense  of  serene  light  and  shade,  as  opposed  to  the 
coruscations  and  horrors  of  modern  attempts  in  that  direction. 
But  it  is  a  pity — and  this  is  the  first  grand  principle  of  etching 

*  The  reference  must,  I  think,  be  to  "  Ariadne  Florentina:  Six  Lectures 
on  Wood  and  Metal  Engraving  given  before  the  University  of  Oxford, 
Michaelmas  Term,  1873,"  and  afterwards  published,  1873-6.  The  lectures 
given  in  the  year  1873  were  upon  Tuscan  Art,  now  published  in  "Val 
d'Arno." 


1873.]  ERNEST   GEORGE's   ETCHINGS.  115 

which  I  feel  it  necessary  to  affirm — ^vlien  the  instinct  of  chia- 
roscuro leads  the  artist  to  spend  time  in  prodncini^  texture  on 
his  phite  which  cannot  be  ultimately  perfect,  however  labored. 
All  the  common  raptures  concerning  blots,  burr,  delicate 
bitimj^,  and  the  other  tricks  of  the  etching  trade,  merely  indi- 
cate imperfect  feeling  for  shadow. 

The  proper  instrument  of  chiaroscuro  is  the  brush  ;  a  wash 
of  sepia,  rightly  managed,  will  do  more  in  ten  minutes  than 
Kembrandt  himself  could  do  in  ten  days  of  the  most  ingenious 
scratching,  or  blurt  out  by  the  most  happy  mixtures  of  art  and 
accident.*  As  soon  as  Mr.  George  has  learned  what  true  light 
and  shade  is  (and  a  few  careful  studies  with  brush  or  chalk 
would  enable  him  to  do  so),  he  will  not  labor  his  etched  sub- 
jects in  vain.  The  virtue  of  an  etching,  in  this  respect,  is  to 
express  perfectly  harmonious  sense  of  light  and  shade,  but  not 
to  realize  it.     All  fine  etchings  are  done  with  few  lines. 

Secondly — and  this  is  a  still  more  important  general  prin- 
ciple (I  must  let  myself  fall  into  dictatorial  terms  for  brevity's 
sake) — Let  your  few  lines  be  sternly  clear,  however  delicate, 
or  however  dark.  All  burr  and  botch  is  child's  play,  and  a 
true  draughtsman  must  never  be  at  the  mercy  of  his  copper 
and  ink.  Drive  your  line  well  and  fairly  home  ;  don't  scrawl 
or  zigzag ;  know  where  your  hand  is  going,  and  what  it  is 
doing,  to  a  hairbreadth  ;  then  bite  clear  and  clean,  and  let  the 
last  impression  be  as  good  as  the  first.  When  it  begins  to  fail 
break  your  plate. 

Third  general  principle. 

Don't  depend  nmch  on  various  biting.  For  a  true  master, 
and  a  great  purpose,  even  one  biting  is  enough.  By  no  flux 
or  dilution  of  acid  can  you  ever  etch  a  curl  of  hair  or  a  cloud  ; 
and  if  you  think  you  can  etch  the  gradations  of  coarser  things, 

*  The  value  of  Rembrandt's  etchings  is  always  in  the  inverse 
ratio  of  the  labor  bestowed  on  them  after  his  first  thoughts  have 
been  decisively  expressed;  and  even  the  best  of  his  chiaroscuros 
(the  spotted  shell,  for  instance)  are  mere  child's  play  compared 
to  the  disciplined  light  and  shade  of  Italian  masters. 


116  LETTERS    Oiq^    ART.  .       [1876. 

it  is  only  because  you  have  never  seen  them.  Try,  at  your 
leisure,  to  etch  a  teacup  or  a  tallow  candle,  of  their  real  size ; 
see  what  you  can  make  of  the  gradations  of  those  familiar 
articles  ;  if  you  succeed  to  your  mind,  you  may  try  something 
more  difficult  afterwards. 

Lastly.  For  all  definite  shades  of  architectural  detail,  use 
pencil  or  charcoal,  or  the  brush,  never  the  pen  point.  You  can 
draw  a  leaf  surface  rightly  in  a  minute  or  two  with  these — 
with  the  pen  point,  never,  to  all  eternity.  And  on  you  know- 
ing what  the  surface  of  a  form  is  depends  your  entire  power 
of  recognizing  good  work.  The  difference  between  thirteenth- 
century  work,  wholly  beautiful,  and  a  cheap  imitation  of  it, 
wholly  damnable,  lies  in  gradation  of  surface  as  subtle  as  those 
of  a  rose-leaf,  and  which  are,  to  modern  sculpture,  what  singing 
is  to  a  steam- whistle. 

For  the  rest,  the  limitation  of  etched  work  to  few  lines 
enables  the  sketcher  to  multiply  his  subjects,  and  make  his  time 
infinitely  more  useful  to  himself  and  others.  I  would  most 
humbly  solicit,  in  conclusion,  such  advantageous  use  of  his  gifts 
from  Mr.  George.  He  might  etch  a  little  summer  tour  for  us 
every  year,  and  give  permanent  and  exquisiterecord  of  a  score  of 
scenes,  rich  in  historical  interest,  with  no  more  pains  than  he  has 
spent  on  one  or  two  of  these  plates  in  drawing  the  dark  sides 
of  a  wall.  Yours  faithfully, 

John   Ruskin. 


[From  "The  Times,"  January  20,  1876.] 

THE  FREDERICK  WALKER   EXHIBITION. 

Dear   Mr.  Marks  :^  You  ask  me  to  say  what  I  feel  of 
Frederick  Walker's  work,  now  seen  in  some  collective  mass,  as 

*  This  letter  was  written  to  Mr.  H.  Stacy  Marks,  A.RA.,  in  answer  to 
a  request  that  Mr.  Ruskin  would  in  some  way  record  his  impression  of  tLe 
Frederick  Walker  Exhibition,  then  open  to  the  public.  Frederick  Walker 
died  in  June,  1875,  at  the  early  age  of  thirty-five,  only  four  years  after 
having  been  elected  an  Associate  of  the  Royal  Academy. 


1876.J  THE   FREDERICK    WALKER    EXHIBITION'.  117 

far  as  anything  can  be  seen  in  l)lack-veik'(l  London.  You 
have  long  known  my  admiration  of  his  genius,  my  deliglit  in 
many  passages  of  his  art.  Tiiese,  while  he  lived,  were  all  I 
cared  to  express.  If  yuu  will  have  me  speak  of  liim  now,  I 
will  speak  the  whole  truth  of  what  I  feel — namely,  that  every 
soul  in  London  interested  in  art  ought  to  go  to  see  that 
Exhibition,  and,  amid  all  the  beauty  and  the  sadness  of  it, 
very  diligently  to  try  and  examine  themselves  as  to  the  share 
they  have  had,  in  their  own  busy  modern  life,  in  arresting  the 
power  of  this  man  at  the  point  where  it  stayed.  Very  chief 
share  they  have  had,  assuredly.  But  he  himself,  in  the  hberal 
and  radical  temper  of  modern  youth,  has  had  his  own  part  in 
casting  down  his  strength,  following  wantonly  or  obstinately 
his  own  fancies  wherever  they  led  him.  For  instance,  it  being 
Nature's  opinion  that  sky  should  usually  be  blue,  and  it  being 
Mr.  Walker's  opinion  that  it  should  be  the  color  of  buff  plaster, 
he  resolutely  makes  it  so,  for  his  own  isolated  satisfaction, 
partly  in  affectation  also,  buff  skies  being  considered  by  the 
public  more  sentimental  than  blue  ones.  Again,  the  laws  of 
all  good  painting  having  been  long  ago  determined  by  absolute 
masters,  whose  work  cannot  be  bettered  nor  departed  from — 
Titian  having  determined  forever  what  oil-painting  is,  Angelico 
what  tempera-painting  is,  Perugino  what  fresco-painting  is, 
two  hundred  years  of  noble  miniature-painting  what  minutest 
work  on  ivory  is,  and,  in  modern  times,  a  score  of  entirely 
skilful  and  disciplined  draughtsmen  what  pure  water-color  and 
pure  body-color  painting  on  paper  are  (Turner's  Yorkshire 
drawing  of  Hornby  Castle,  now  at  Kensington,  and  John 
Lewis's  "Encampment  under  Sinai,"*  being  namable  at  once 
as  unsurpassable  standards),  here  is  Mr.  AYalker  refusing  to 
learn  anything  from  any  of  those  schools  or  masters,  but 
inventing  a  semi-miniature,  quarter  fresco,  quarter  wash  man- 
ner of  his  own — exquisitely  clever,  and  reaching,  under  such 

*  The  "Hornby  Castle"  was  executed,  together  with  tlie  rest  of  the 
"  great  Yorkshire  series,"  for  Whitaker's  "History  of  Hichmondshire" 
(Longman,  1823).— The  picture  of  John  Lewis  liere  alhided  to  is  described 
in  Mr.  Ruskin's  "Academy  Notes,"  1856,  No.  H.,  p.  37. 


118  LETTERS   ON"   ART.  [1876. 

clever  management,  delightfullest  results  here  and  there,  but 
which  betrays  his  genius  into  perpetual  experiment  instead  of 
achievement,  and  his  life  into  woful  vacillation  between  the 
good,  old,  quiet  room  of  the  Water-Color  Society,  and  your 
labyrinthine  magnificence  at  Burlington  House. 

Lastly,  and  in  worst  error,  the  libraries  of  England  being 
full  of  true  and  noble  books — her  annals  of  true  and  noble 
history,  and  her  traditions  of  beautiful  and  noble — in  these 
scientific  times  I  must  say,  I  suppose,  "mythology" — not 
religion — from  all  these  elements  of  mental  education  and  sub- 
jects of  serviceable  art,  he  turns  recklessly  away  to  enrich  the 
advertisements  of  the  circulating  library,  to  sketch  whatever 
pleases  his  fancy,  barefooted,  or  in  dainty  boots,  of  modern 
beggary  and  fashion,  and  enforce,  with  laboriously  symbolical 
pathos,  his  adherence  to  Justice  Shallow's  sublime  theology 
that  "  all  shall  die." 

That  theology  has  indeed  been  preached  by  stronger  men, 
again  and  again,  from  Horace's  days  to  our  own,  but  never  to 
so  little  i^urpose.  "  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we 
die,"  said  wisely  in  his  way,  the  Latin  farmer :  ate  his  beans 
and  bacon  in  comfort,  had  his  suppers  of  the  gods  on  the  fair 
earth,  with  his  servants  jesting,  round  the  table,  and  left 
eternal  monuments  of  earthly  wisdom  and  of  cricket-song. 
"  Let  us  labor  and  be  just,  for  to-morrow  we  die,  and  after 
death  the  Judgment,"  said  Holbein  and  Durer,  and  left  eternal 
monuments  of  upright  human  toil  and  honorable  gloom  of 
godly  fear.  "  Let  us  rejoice  and  be  exceeding  glad,  for  to- 
morrow we  die,  and  shall  be  with  God,"  said  Angelico  and 
Giotto,  and  left  eternal  monuments  of  divinely-blazoned 
heraldry  of  Heaven.  "Let  us  smoke  pipes,  make  money, 
read  bad  novels,  walk  in  bad  air,  and  say  sentimentally  how 
sick  we  are  in  the  afternoon,  for  to-morrow  we  die,  and  shall 
be  made  ourselves  clay  pipes,"  says  the  modern  world,  and 
drags  this  poor  bright  painter  down  into  the  abyss  with  it, 
vainly  clutching  at  a  handful  or  two  of  scent  and  flowers  in 
the  May  gardens; 

Under  which  sorrowful   terms,  being  told  also  by  your 


1876.]  THE    FREDERICK    WALKER    EXHIBITION.  119 

grand  Acadeiinciaiis  that  he  should  paint  tlie  nude,  and,  ac- 
cordingly, wasting  a  year  or  two  of  his  life  in  trying  to  paint 
schoolboys'  backs  and  legs  without  their  shirts  or  breeches,  and 
with  such  other  magazine  material  as  he  can  pick  up  of  sick 
gypsies,  faded  gentlewomen,  pretty  girls  disguised  as  paupers, 
and  the  red-roofed  or  gray  remnants  of  old  English  villages 
and  manor-house,  last  wrecks  of  the  country's  peace  and  honor, 
remaining  yet  visible  among  the  black  ravages  of  its  ruin,  he 
supplies  the  demands  of  his  temporary  public,  scarcely  patient, 
even  now  that  he  has  gone,  to  pause  beside  his  delicate  tulips 
or  under  his  sharp-leaved  willows,  and  repent  for  the  passing 
tints  and  fallen  petals  of  the  life  that  might  have  been  so 
precious,  and,  perhaps,  in  better  days,  prolonged. 

That  is  the  main  moral  of  the  Exhibition,  Of  the  beauty 
of  the  drawings,  accepting  them  for  what  they  aim  at  being, 
there  is  little  need  that  I  should  add  anything  to  what  has 
been  already  said  rightly  by  the  chief  organs  of  the  London 
Press.  Nothing  can  go  beyond  them  in  subtlety  of  exhibited 
touch  (to  be  distinguished,  however,  observe  always  from  the 
serene  completion  of  master's  work,  disdaining  the  applause  to 
be  gained  by  its  manifestation);  their  harmonies  of  amber- 
color  and  purple  are  full  of  exquisite  beauty  in  their  chosen 
key ;  their  composition  always  graceful,  often  admirable,  and 
the  sympathy  they  express  with  all  conditions  of  human  life 
most  kind  and  true  ;  not  without  power  of  rendering  charac- 
ter which  would  have  been  more '  recognized  in  an  inferior 
artist,  because  it  would  have  been  less  restrained  by  the  love 
of  beauty. 

I  might,  perhaps,  in  my  days  of  youth  and  good  fortune, 
have  written  wdiat  the  pul)lic  would  have  called  "  eloquent 
passages"  on  the  subjects  of  the  Almshouse  and  the  Old 
Gate  f  being  now  myself  old  and  decrepit  (besides  being  much 

*  The  following  are  the  pictures,  as  catalogued,  mentioned  here: 
1.   "The  Almshouse"— No.  52— called  "The  House  of  Refuge."    Oil  on 
canvas.     A  garden  and  terrace  in  quadrangle  of  almshouses;  on  loft  an  old 
woman  and  girl;  on  right  a  mower  cutting  grass,     Exhihited  R.  A.  1872. 
3.  "  The  Old  Gate"— No.  48— oil  on  canvas.     Lady  in  black  and  servant 


120  LETTERS   0:^-   ART.  [1876. 

bothered  with  beggars,  and  in  perpetual  feud  with  parish  offi- 
cers), and  having  seen  every  building  I  cared  for  in  the  world 
ruined,  I  pass  these  two  pictures  somewhat  hastily  by,  and  try 
to  enjoy  myself  a  little  in  the  cottage  gardens.  Only  one  of 
them,  however, — No.  71, — has  right  sunshine  in  it,  and  that  is 

with  basket  coming  through  the  gate  of  old  mansion ;  four  children  at  play 
at  foot  of  steps;  two  villagers  and  dog  in  foreground.  Exhibited  R.  A. 
1869. 

3.  "The  Cottage  Gardens"— No.  71,  "The  Spring  of  Life."  Water- 
color.  Lady  in  a  garden  with  two  children  and  a  lamb ;  a  cherry  tree  in 
blossom.  Exhibited  at  the  Water-Color  Society,  Winter  1866-7.  See  also 
Nos.  14  and  21. 

4.  "Ladies  and  Lilies" — No.  37,  "A  Lady  in  a  Garden,  Perthshire." 
Water-color.  A  lady  seated  on  a  knoll  on  which  is  a  sun-dial;  greyhound 
on  left;  background,  old  manor-house.  No.  67,  "Lilies."  Water-color. 
Lady  in  a  garden  watering  flowers,  chiefly  lilies.  Exhibited  at  the  Water- 
Color  Society,  Winter  1869-70  and  1868-9  respectively. 

5.  "  The  Chaplain's  Daughter" — No.  20,  subject  from  Miss  Thackeray's 
"Jack  the  Giant-killer."  Exhibited  at  the  Water-Color  Society,  Summer 
1868. 

6.  "Daughter  of  Heth,"  by  W.  Black.  No.  87.  "Do  ye  no  ken  this  is 
the  Sabbath?"  Young  lady  at  piano;  servant  enters  hurriedly.  (Study  in 
black  and  white,  executed  in  1872.) — [See  vol.  i.  p.  41.  "  *  Preserve  us  a', 
lassie,  do  ye  ken  what  ye're  doing  ?  Do  ye  no  ken  that  this  is  the  Sabbath, 
and  that  you're  in  a  respectable  house? '  The  girl  turned  round  with  more 
wonder  than  alarm  in  her  face :  '  Is  it  not  right  to  play  music  on  Sunday? '  "] 
— (No.  131.     Three  more  studies  for  the  same  novel.) 

7.  "  The  Old  Farm  Garden"— No.  33— Water-color.  A  girl,  with  cat  on 
lawn,  knitting;  garden  path  bordered  by  tulips;  farm  buildings  in  back- 
ground.    Painted  in  1871. 

8.  "Salmon-fishers" — No.  47 — "Fisherman  and  Boy" — Water-color. 
Keeper  and  boy  on  bank  of  river.  Glen  Spean.  Salmon  in  foreground. 
Exhibited  at  the  Water-Color  Society,  Summer  1867. 

9.  Mushrooms  and  Fungi — No.  41 — Water-color.     Painted  in  1873. 

10.  "Fishmonger's  Stalls"— Nos.  9  and  62  (not  952)— viz..  No.  9,  "  A 
Fishmonger's  Shop."  Water-color.  Painted  in  1873;  and  No.  62,  also  "A 
Fishmonger's  Shop."  Water-color.  Fishmongers  selling  fish;  lady  and 
boy  in  costumes  of  about  1800.  Exhibited  at  Water-Color  Society,  Winter 
1872-3.  (The  "Tobias"  of  Perugino  has  been  already  alluded  to,  p.  44, 
note.) 

11.  No.  68.  "The  Ferry."  Water-color.  Sight  size,  llf  X  18  in.  A 
ferry  boat,  in  which  are  two  figures,  a  boatman  and  a  lady,  approaching  a 
landing-place ;  on  the  bank  figures  of  villagers,  and  children  feeding  swans. 
Exhibited  at  Water-Color  Society,  Winter  1870-71. 


1876.]  THE    FREDERICK    WALKER   EXHIBITIOX.  1*H 

a  sort  of  walled  paddock  where  I  begin  directly  to  feel  nnconi- 
fortable  about  the  lamb,  lest,  perchance,  some  front  shop  in 
the  cottages  belong  to  a  bntcher.  If  only  it  and  I  could  get 
away  to  a  bit  of  thymy  hill-side,  we  should  be  so  much  happier, 
leaving  the  luminous — perhaps  too  ideally  luminous — child  to 
adorn  the  pathetic  paddock.  I  am  too  shy  to  speak  to  either 
of  those  two  beautiful  ladies  among  the  lilies  (37,  GT),  and  take 
refuge  among  the  shy  children  before  the  "Chaplain's  Daugh- 
ter" (20) — delightfullest,  it  seems  to  me,  of  the  minor  designs, 
and  a  piece  of  most  true  and  wise  satire.  The  sketches  of  the 
"  Daughter  of  Heth"  go  far  to  tempt  me  to  read  the  novel ; 
and,  ashamed  of  this  weakness,  I  retreat  resolutely  to  the  side 
of  the  exemplary  young  girl  knitting  in  the  "  Old  Farm 
Garden"  (33),  and  would  instantly  pick  up  her  ball  of  worsted 
for  her,  but  that  I  wouldn't  for  the  world  disappoint  the  cat. 
No  drawing  in  the  I'oom  is  more  delicately  completed  than  this 
unpretending  subject,  and  the  flower-painting  in  it,  for  instan- 
taneous grace  of  creative  touch,  cannot  l)e  rivalled  ;  it  is  worth 
all  the  Dutch  flo^ver-pieces  in  the  world. 

Much  instructed,  and  more  humiliated,  by  passage  after 
passage  of  its  rapidly-grouped  color,  I  get  Anally  away  into 
the  comfortable  corner  beside  the  salmon-fishers  and  the  mush- 
rooms ;  and  the  last-named  drawing,  despise  me  who  may, 
keeps  me  till  Tve  no  more  time  to  stay,  for  it  entirely  beats 
my  dear  old  William  Hunt  in  the  simplicity  of  its  execution, 
and  rivals  him  in  the  subtlest  truth. 

I  say  nothing  of  the  "  Fishmonger's  Stalls"  (952),  though 
there  are  qualities  of  the  same  kind  in  these  also,  for  they 
somewhat  provoke  me  by  their  waste  of  time — the  labor  spent 
on  one  of  them  would  have  painted  twenty  instructive  studies 
of  fish  of  their  real  size.  And  it  is  well  for  artists  in  creneral  to 
observe  that  when  they  do  condescend  to  paint  still  life  care- 
fully— whether  fruit,  fungi,  or  fish — it  must  at  least  be  of  the 
real  size.  The  portrait  of  a  man  or  woman  is  only  justifiably 
made  small  that  it  may  be  portable,  and  nobody  wants  to  carry 
about  the  miniature  of  a  cod ;  and  if  the  reader  will  waste  five 
minutes  of  his  season  in  London  in  the  National  Gallery,  he 


122  LETTERS    ON    ART.  [1876. 

may  see  in  the  hand  of  Perugino's  Tobias  a  fish  worth  all  these 
on  the  boards  together. 

Some  blame  of  the  same  kind  attaches  to  the  marvellous 
drawing  No.  6S.  It  is  all  very  well  for  a  young  artist  to  show 
how  much  woi'k  he  can  put  into  an  inch,  but  very  painful  for 
an  old  gentleman  of  fifty-seven  to  have  to  make  out  all  the 
groups  through  a  magnifying-glass.  I  could  say  something 
malicious  about  the  boat,  in  consequence  of  the  effect  of  this 
exertion  on  my  temper,  but  will  not,  and  leave  with  unqualified 
praise  the  remainder  of  the  lesser  drawings  to  the  attention 
which  each  will  variously  reward. 

Nor,  in  what  I  have  already,  it  may  be  thought,  too  bluntly 
said,  ought  the  friends  of  the  noble  artist  to  feel  that  I  am 
unkind.  It  is  because  I  know  his  real  power  more  deeply  than 
any  of  the  admirers  who  give  him  indiscriminate  applause, 
that  I  think  it  right  distinctly  to  mark  the  causes  which  pre- 
vented his  reaching  heights  they  did  not  conceive,  and  ended 
by  placing  one  more  tablet  in  the  street  of  tombs,  which  the 
passionate  folly  and  uninstructed  confusion  of  modern  Eng- 
lish society  prolong  into  dark  perspective  above  the  graves  of 
its  youth. 

I  am,  dear  Marks,  always  very  faithfully  yours, 

J.    EUSKIN. 


LETTERS   ON  ART. 


VI. 

ARCHITECTURE. 


Gothic  Akchitecture  and  the  Oxford  Museum.    1858. 

Gothic  Architecture  and  the  Oxford  Museum.    1859. 

The  Castle  Rock  (Edinburgh).    1857  (Sept.  14). 

Edinburgh  Castle.     1857  (Sept.  17). 

Castles  and  Kennels.     1871  (Dec.  22). 

Verona  v.  Warwick.     1871  (Dec.  24). 

Notre  Dame  de  Paris.    1871. 

Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence — A  Defence.    1872  (March  15). 

Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence— A  Rejoinder.    1872  (March  21). 

Modern  Restoration.    1877. 

Rlbbesford  Chltich.    1877. 

Circular  relating  to  St.  IMark's.  Venice.    1879. 


YI. 

AEGIIITECTUEE. 

[From  "The  Oxford  Museum,"  by  H.  W.  Acland  and  J.  Raskin.    1859.    pp.  44-50.  J 

GOTniC  ARCHITECTURE  AND    THE   OXFORD  MUSEUM* 

Dear  Acland  :  I  have  been  very  anxious,  since  I  last 
heard  from  yon,  respecting  the  progress  of  the  woi-ks  at  tlie 
Museum,  as  I  thought  I  could  trace  in  your  expressions  some 
doubt  of  an  entirely  satisfactory  issue. 

Entirely  satisfactory  very  few  issues  are,  or  can  be;  and 
when  the  enterprise,  as  in  this  instance,  involves  the  develop- 

*  In  1858  the  Oxford  Museum  was  in  course  of  building,  its  architects 
being  Sir  Thomas  Deane  and  Mr.  Woodward,  and  its  st3ie  modern  Gothic, 
whilst  amongst  those  chiefly  interested  in  it  were  Dr.  Acland  (the  Regius 
Professor  of  Medicine)  and  Mr.  Ruskin.  The  present  letter,  written  in 
June,  1858,  was  read  by  Dr.  Acland  at  a  lecture  given  by  him  in  that  sum- 
mer "to  the  members  of  the  Architectural  Societies  that  met  in  Oxford  " 
at  that  time.  I  am  permitted  to  reprint  the  following  passage  from  Dr. 
Acland's  preface  to  the  printed  lecture,  as  well  as  one  or  two  passages  from 
the  lecture  itself  (see  below,  pp.  130  and  133):  "Many  have  yet  to  learn 
the  apparently  simple  truth,  that  to  an  Artist  his  Art  is  his  means  of  proba- 
tion in  this  life;  and  that,  whatever  it  may  have  of  frivolity  to  us,  to  him 
it  is  as  the  two  or  the  five  talents,  to  be  accounted  for  hereafter.  I  might  .'^ay 
much  on  this  point,  for  the  full  scope  of  the  word  Art  seems  by  some  to  be 
even  now  unrecognized.  Before  the  period  of  printing,  Art  was  the  largest 
mode  of  permanently  recording  human  thought;  it  was  spoken  in  every 
epoch,  in  all  countries,  and  delivered  in  almost  every  material.  In  build- 
ings, on  medals  and  coins,  in  porcelain  and  earthenware,  on  wood,  ivory, 
parchment,  paper  and  canvas,  the  graver  or  the  pencil  has  recorded  the 
ideas  of  every  form  of  society,  of  every  variety  of  race  and  of  every 
character.  What  wonder  that  the  Artist  is  jealous  of  his  craft,  and  proud 
of  his  brotherhood  ?"— See  "The  Oxford  Museum,"  p.  4.  The  reader  is 
also  referred  to  "  Sesame  and  Lilies,"  1871  ed.,  §§  103-4. 


126  LETTERS   OX   AET.  [1859. 

merit  of  many  new  and  progressive  principles,  we  must  always 
be  prepared  for  a  due  measure  of  disappointment, — due  partly 
to  human  weakness,  and  partly  to  what  the  ancients  would 
have  called  fate, — and  we  may,  j^erhaps,  most  wisely  call  the 
law  of  trial,  Avhich  forbids  any  great  good  being  usually 
accomplished  without  various  compensations  and  deductions, 
probably  not  a  little  humiliating. 

Perhaps  in  writing  to  you  what  seems  to  me  to  be  the 
bearing  of  matters  respecting  your  Museum,  I  may  be  answer- 
ing a  few  of  the  doubts  of  others,  as  well  as  fears  of  your  own. 

I  am  quite  sure  tliat  when  you  first  used  your  influence  to 
advocate  the  claims  of  a  Gothic  design,  you  did  so  under  the 
conviction,  shared  by  all  the  seriously-purposed  defenders  of 
the  Gothic  style,  that  the  essence  and  power  of  Gothic, 
properly  so  called,  lay  in  its  adaptability  to  all  need ;  in  that 
perfect  and  unlimited  flexibility  which  would  enable  the 
architect  to  j)rovide  all  that  was  required,  in  the  simplest  and 
most  convenient  way ;  and  to  give  you  the  best  oflices,  the  best 
lecture-rooms,  laboratories,  and  museums,  which  could  be 
provided  with  the  sum  of  money  at  his  disposal. 

So  far  as  the  architect  has  failed  in  doing  this ;  so  far  as 
you  find  yourself,  with  the  other  j)rofessors,  in  anywise  incon- 
venienced by  forms  of  architecture ;  so  far  as  pillars  or  j^iers 
come  in  your  way,  when  you  have  to  point,  or  vaults  in  the 
way  of  your  voice,  when  you  have  to  speak,  or  muUions  in  the 
way  of  your  light,  when  you  want  to  see — just  so  far  the 
architect  has  failed  in  expressing  his  own  principles,  or  those 
of  pure  Gothic  art.  I  do  not  suppose  that  such  failure  has 
taken  place  to  any  considerable  extent ;  but  so  far  as  it  has 
taken  place,  it  cannot  in  justice  be  laid  to  the  score  of  the  style, 
since  precedent  has  shown  sufliciently,  that  very  uncomfortable 
and  useless  rooms  may  be  provided  in  all  other  styles  as  well 
as  in  Gothic ;  and  I  think  if,  in  a  building  arranged  for  many 
objects  of  various  kinds,  at  a  time  when  the  practice  of  archi- 
tecture has  been  somewhat  confused  by  the  inventions  of 
modern  science,  and  is  hardly  yet  organized  completely  with 
respect   to   the   new   means   at  his  disposal ;   if,  under   such 


1859.]  THE   OXFORD    MUSEUM.  1'^; 

circumstances,  and  with  somewhat  limited  funds,  you  liuvf  vct 
obtained  a  building  in  all  main  points  properly  fultlllinc-  its 
requirements,  you  have,  I  think,  as  much  as  could  be  hoped 
from  the  adoption  of  any  style  whatsoever. 

But  I  am  much  more  anxious  al)out  thi'  decoration  of  the 
building;  for  I  fear  that  it  will  be  hurried  in  complutinn,  and 
that,  partly  in  haste  and  partly  in  mi^itinled  efonomy,  a  great 
opportunity  may  be  lost  of  advancing  the  best  interest  of 
architectural,  and  in  that,  uf  all  other  arts.  For  the  principles 
of  Gothic  decoration,  in  themselves  as  simple  and  beautiful  as 
those  of  Gothic  construction,  are  far  less  understood,  as  yet, 
by  the  English  pul)lic,  and  it  is  little  likely  that  any  effective 
measures  can  be  taken  to  carry  them  out.  You  know  as  well 
as  I,  what  those  principles  are;  yet  it  may  be  convenient  to 
you  that  I  should  here  state  them  briefly  as  I  accept  them 
myself,  and  have  reason  to  suppose  they  are  accepted  by  the 
principal  promoters  of  the  Gothic  revival. 

I.  The  first  principle  of  Gothic  decoration  is  that  a  given 
cpiantity  of  good  art  will  be  more  generally  useful  when 
exhibited  on  a  large  scale,  and  forming  part  of  a  connected 
system,  than  when  it  is  small  and  separated.  That  is  to  say,  a 
piece  of  sculpture  or  painting,  of  a  certain  allowed  merit,  will 
be  more  usefiil  when  seen  on  the  front  of  a  building,  or  at 
the  end  of  a  room,  and  therefore  by  many  persons,  than  if  it 
be  so  small  as  to  be  only  capable  of  being  seen  by  one  or  two 
at  a  time ;  and  it  will  be  more  useful  when  so  combined  with 
other  work  as  to  produce  that  kind  of  imj^ression  usually 
termed  "  sublime," — as  it  is  felt  on  looking  at  any  great  series 
of  fixed  paintings,  or  at  the  front  of  a  cathedral, — than  if  it  be 
so  separated  as  to  excite  only  a  special  wonder  or  admiration, 
such  as  we  feel  for  a  jewel  in  a  cabinet. 

The  paintings  by  Meissonier  in  the  French  Exhibition  of 
this  year  were  bought,  I  believe,  before  the  Exhibition  opened, 
for  250  guineas  each.  They  each  represented  one  figure, 
about  six  inches  high — one,  a  student  reading;  the  other, 
a  courtier  standing  in  a  dress-coat.  Neither  of  these  paintings 
conveyed  any  information,  or  produced  any  enu.ttion  whatever. 


138  LETTERS   OX    ART.  [1859. 

except  that  of  surprise  at  their  minute  and  dextrous  execution. 
Thej  will  be  placed  by  their  possessors  on  the  walls  of  small 
private  apartments,  where  they  will  probably,  once  or  twice  a 
week,  form  the  subject  of  five  minutes'  conversation  while 
people  drink  their  coffee  after  dinner.  The  sum^ expended  on 
these  toys  would  have  been  amply  sufficient  to  cover  a  large 
building  with  noble  frescos,  appealing  to  every  passer-by,  and 
representing  a  large  portion  of  the  history  of  any  given  period. 
But  the  general  tendency  of  the  European  patrons  of  art  is 
to  grudge  all  sums  spent  in  a  way  thus  calculated  to  confer 
benefit  on  the  public,  and  to  grudge  none  for  minute  treasures 
of  which  the  principal  advantage  is  that  a  lock  and  key  can 
always  render  them  invisible. 

I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  an  acquisitive  selfishness, 
rejoicing  somewhat  even  in  the  sensation  of  possessing  what 
can  NOT  be  seen  by  others,  is  at  the  root  of  this  art-pat i-on age. 
It  is,  of  course,  coupled  with  a  sense  of  securer  and  more  con- 
venient investment  in  what  may  be  easily  protected  and  easily 
carried  from  place  to  place,  than  in  large  and  immovable 
works ;  and  also  with  a  vulgar  delight  in  the  minute  curiosities 
of  productive  art,  rather  than  in  the  exercise  of  inventive 
genius,  or  the  expression  of  great  facts  or  emotions. 

The  first  aim  of  the  Gothic  Revivalists  is  to  counteract,  as 
far  as  possible,  this  feeling  on  all  its  three  grounds.  We 
desire  (a)  to  make  art  large  and  publicly  beneficial,  instead 
of  small  and  privately  engrossed  or  secluded ;  (b)  to  make  art 
fixed  instead  of  portable,  associating  it  with  local  character  and 
historical  memory;  (c)  to  make  art  expressive  instead  of 
curious,  valuable  for  its  suggestions  and  teachings,  more  than 
for  the  mode  of  its  manufacture. 

11.  The  second  great  principle  of  the  Gothic  Eevivalists  is 
that  all  art  em])loyed  in  decoration  should  be  informative,  con- 
veying truthful  statements  about  natural  facts,  if  it  conveys 
any  statement.  It  may  sometimes  merely  compose  its  decora- 
tions of  mosaics,  checkers,  bosses,  or  other  meaningless  orna- 
ments :  but  if  it  represents  organic  form  (and  in  all  important 
places  it  will  represent  it),  it  will  give  that  form  truthfully, 


1859.]  THE   OXFORD   MUSEUM.  129 

with  as  much  resemblance  to  nature  as  the  necessary  treatment 
of  the  piece  of  ornament  in  question  will  admit  of. 

This  principle  is  more  disputed  than  the  lirst  among  the 
Gothic  Revivalists  themselves.  I,  however,  huld  it  simj)ly  and 
entirely,  believing  that  ornamentation  is  always,  cceter is  pari- 
bus^ most  valuable  and  beautiful  when  it  is  founded  on  the 
most  extended  knowledge  of  natural  forms,  and  conveys  con- 
tinually such  knowledge  to  the  spectator.'"' 

III.  The  third  great  princii)le  of  the  (lothic  Kevival  is  that 
all  architectural  ornamentation  slioukl  be  executed  by  the  men 
who  design  it,  and  should  be  of  various  degrees  of  excellence, 
admitting,  and  therefore  exciting,  the  intelligent  co-oi)eration 
of  various  classes  of  workmen ;  and  that  a  great  public  ediiice 
should  be,  in  sculpture  and  painting,  somewhat  the  same  as  a 
great  chorus  of  music,  in  which,  while,  perhaps,  there  may  be 
only  one  or  two  voices  perfectly  trained,  and  of  perfect  sweet- 
ness (the  rest  being  in  various  degrees  weaker  and  less  culti- 
vated), yet  all  being  ruled  in  harmony,  and  each  sustaining  a 
part  consistent  with  its  strength,  the  body  of  sound  is  sublime, 
in  spite  of  individual  weaknesses. 

The  Museum  at  Oxford  was,"  I  know,  intended  by  its 
designer  to  exhibit  in  its  decoration  the  working  of  these  three 
principles ;  but  in  the  very  fact  of  its  doing  so,  it  becomes 
exposed  to  chances  of  occasional  failure,  or  even  to  serious  dis- 
comfitures, such  as  would  not  at  all  have  attended  the  adoption 
of  an  established  mode  of  modern  work.  It  is  easy  to  carve 
capitals  on  models  known  for  four  thousand  years,  and  impos- 
sible to  fail  in  the  application  of  mechanical  methods  and  for- 
malized rules.  But  it  is  not  possible  to  appeal  vigorously  to 
new  canons  of  judgment  without  the  chance  of  giving  olfence  ; 
nor  to  summon  into  service  the  various  phases  of  human  tem- 
per and  intelligence,  without  occasionally  finding  the  tempers 
rough  and  the  intelligence  feeble.  The  Oxford  Museum  is,  I 
believe,  the  first  building  in  this  country  which  has  had  its 
ornamentation,  in  any  telling  parts,  trusted  to  the  invention  of 

*  See  next  letter,  pp.  131  seqq. 


130  LETTERS  OK  ART.  [1859. 

the  workman  :  tlie  result  is  highly  satisfactory,  the  projecting 
windows  of  the  staircases  being  as  beautiful  in  effect  as  any- 
thing I  know  in  civil  Gothic :  but  far  more  may  be  accom- 
plished for  the  building  if  the  completion  of  its  carving  be  not 
hastened ;  many  men  of  high  artistic  power  might  be  brought 
to  take  an  interest  in  it,  and  various  lessons  and  suggestions 
given  to  the  workmen  which  w^ould  matei'ially  advantage  the 
hnal  decoration  of  leading  features.  No  very  great  Gothic 
building,  so  far  as  I  know,  was  ever  yet  completed  without 
some  of  this  wise  deliberation  and  fruitful  patience. 

I  was  in  hopes  from  the  beginning  that  the  sculpture  might 
have  been  rendered  typically  illustrative  of  the  English  Flora : 
how  far  this  idea  has  been  as  yet  carried  out  I  do  not  know ; 
but  I  know  that  it  cannot  be  properly  carried  out  without  a 
careful  examination  of  the  available  character  of  the  principal 
genera,  such  as  architects  have  not  hitherto  undertaken.  The 
proposal  which  I  heard  advanced  the  other  day,  of  adding  a 
bold  entrance-porch  to  the  facade,  appeared  to  me  every  way 
full  of  advantage,  the  blankness  of  the  facade  having  been,  to 
my  mind,  from  the  first,  a  serious  fault  in  the  design.  If  a  sub- 
scription were  opened  for  the  purpose  of  erecting  one,  I  should 
think  there  were  few  persons  interested  in  modern  art  who 
would  not  be  glad  to  join  in  forwarding  such  an  object. 

I  think  I  could  answer  for  some  portions  of  the  design  being 
superintended  by  the  best  of  our  modern  sculptors  and  painters ; 
and  I  believe  that,  if  so  superintended,  the  porch  might  and 
would  become  the  crowning  beauty  of  the  building,  and  make 
all  the  difference  between  its  being  only  a  satisfactory  and 
meritorious  work,  or  a  most  lovely  and  impressive  one. 

The  interior  decoration  is  a  matter  of  much  greater  diffi.- 
culty;  perhaps  you  will  allow  me  to  defer  the  few  words  I 
have  to  say  about  it  till  1  have  time  for  another  letter :  which, 
however,  I  hope  to  find  speedily. 

Believe  me,  my  dear  Acland,  ever  affectionately  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN.* 

*  After  reading  this  letter  to  his  audience,  Dr.  Acland  thus  continued  : 
"The   principles  thus  clearly  enumerated    by  Mr.  Ruskin  are,  on  the 


1859.]  THE   OXl'OKD    MUSEUM.  131 

[From  "  The  Oxford  Museum,"  pp.  00-90.] 

GOTHIC  ARCHITECTURE  AND   THE  OXFORD  MUSEUM. 

January  20,  1859. 

Mv  DKAR  AcLAXD  :  1  was  not  able  to  write,  as  I  had  hoped, 
from  Switzerland,  for  I  found  it  impossible  to  lay  down  any  prin- 
ciples respecting  the  decoration  of  the  Museum  which  did  not  in 
one  way  or  other  involve  disputed  points,  too  many,  and  too 
subtle,  to  be  discussed  in  a  letter.  Nor  do  I  feel  the  difficulty  less 
in  writing  to  you  now.  so  far  as  regards  the  question  occurring  in 
our  late  conversations,  respecting  tho  best  mode  of  completing 
these  interior  decorations.  Yet  I  nmst  write,  if  only  to  ask 
that  I  may  be  in  some  way  associated  with  you  in  what  you  are 
now  doing  to  bring  the  Museum  more  definitely  before  tlu? 
public  mind — that  I  may  be  associated  at  least  in  the  expression 
of  my  deep  sense  of  the  noble  purpose  of  the  building — of  tlie 
noble  sincerity  of  effort  in  its  architect — of  the  endless  good 
which  the  teachings  to  which  it  will  be  devoted  must,  in  their 
ultimate  issue,  accomplish  for  mankind.  How  vast  the  range 
of  that  issue,  you  have  shown  in  the  lecture  which  I  have  just 
read,  in  which  you  have  so  admirably  traced  the  chain  of  the 
physical  sciences  as  it  encompasses  the  great  concords  of  this 

main,  tho.?o  that  animate  the  earnest  student  of  Gothic.  It  is  not  for  me 
especially  to  advocate  Gothic  Art,  but  only  to  urge,  that  if  called  into  life, 
it  should  be  in  conformity  to  its  own  proper  laws  of  vitality.  If  week  after 
week,  in  my  youth,  with  fresh  senses  and  a  docile  spirit,  I  have  drank  in 
each  golden  glow  that  is  poured  by  a  Mediterranean  sun  from  over  the  blue 
-^goDan  upon  the  Athenian  Parthenon, — if,  day  by  day,  sitting  on  3Iars* 
Hill,  I  have  watched  each  purple  shadow,  as  the  temple  darkened  in 
majesty  against  the  evening  sky,— if  so,  it  has  been  to  teach  me,  as  the 
alphabet  of  all  Art,  to  love  all  truth  and  to  hate  all  falsehood,  and  to  kiss 
the  hand  of  every  blaster  who  has  brought  down,  under  whatever  circum- 
stance, and  in  whatever  age,  one  spark  of  teue  light  from  the  Beauty  and 
the  subtle  Law,  which  stamps  the  meanest  work  of  the  Ever-living,  Ever- 
working  Artist."—"  The  Oxford  Mu.«<eum,"  pp.  5G-7. 


132  •  LETTERS   OK   ART.  [1859. 

visible  universe.*  But  liow  deep  the  workings  of  these  new 
springs  of  knowledge  are  to  be,  and  how  great  our  need  of 
them,  and  how  far  the  brightness  and  the  beneficence  of  them 
are  to  reach  among  all  the  best  interests  of  men — perhaps  none 
of  us  can  yet  conceive,  far  less  know  or  say.  For,  much  as  I 
reverence  pliysical  science  as  a  means  of  mental  education  (and 
you  know  how  I  have  contended  for  it,  as  such,  now  these 
twenty  years,  from  the  sunny  afternoon  of  spring  when  Ehren- 
berg  and  jou  and  I  went  hunting  for  infusoria  in  Christchurch 
meadow  streams,  to  the  hour  when  the  prize  offered  by  Sir 
Walter  Trevelyan  and  yourself  for  the  best  essay  on  the  Fauna 
of  that  meadow,  marked  the  ojDcning  of  a  new  era  in  English 
educationf) — nmch,  1  say,  as  I  reverence  physical  science  in 

*See  "The  Oxford  Museun\,"  pp.  17-23.  The  following  is  a  portion 
of  the  passage  alluded  to:  "Without  the  Geologist  on  one  side,  and  the 
Anatomist  and  Physiologist  on  the  other,  Zoology  is  not  worthy  of  its 
name.  The  student  of  life,  bearing  in  mind  the  more  general  laws  which 
in  the  several  departments  above  named  he  will  have  sought  to  appreciate, 
will  find  in  the  collections  of  Zoology,  combined  with  the  Geological  speci- 
mens and  the  dissections  of  the  Anatomist,  a  boundless  field  of  interest  and 
of  inquny,  to  wiiich  almost  every  other  science  lends  its  aid:  from  each 
science  he  borrows  a  special  light  to  guide  him  through  the  ranges  of  extinct 
and  existing  animal  forms,  from  the  lowest  up  to  the  highest  types,  which, 
last  and  most  perfect,  but  preshadowed  in  previous  ages,  is  seen  in  Man, 
By  the  aid  of  physiological  illustrations  he  begins  to  understand  how  hard 
to  unravel  are  the  complex  mechanisms  and  prescient  intentions  of  the 
Maker  of  all;  and  he  slowly  learns  to  appreciate  what  exquisite  care  is 
needed  for  discovering  the  real  action  of  even  an  apparently  comprehended 
machine.  And  so  at  last,  almost  bewildered,  but  not  cast  down,  he  attempts 
to  scrutinize  in  the  rooms  devoted  to  Medicine,  the  various  injuries  which 
man  is  doomed  to  undergo  in  his  progress  towards  death ;  he  begins  to  revere 
the  beneficent  contrivances  which  shine  forth  in  the  midst  of  suffering  and 
disease,  and  to  veil  his  face  before  the  mysterious  alterations  of  structure, 
to  which  there  seem  attached  pain,  with  scarce  relief,  and  a  steady  advance, 
without  a  check,  to  death.  He  will  look,  and  as  he  looks,  will  cherish 
hope,  not  unmixed  with  prayer,  that  the  great  Art  of  Healing  may  by  all 
these  things  advance,  and  that  by  the  progress  of  profounder  science,  by 
the  spread  among  the  people  of  the  resultant  practical  knowledge,  by  stricter 
obedience  to  physiological  laws,  bj''  a  consequent  more  self-denying  spirit, 
some  disorders  may  at  a  future,  day  be  cured,  which  cannot  be  prevented, 
and  some,  perhaps,  prevented,  which  never  can  be  cured." 

f  Christian  Gottfried  Ehrenberg,  the  naturalist  and  author  of  many 


1859.]  THE    OXFORD    MUSEUM.  133 

this  function,  I  reverence  it,  at  this  niuiiit'iit,  iiioiv  as  the  source 
of  utmost  human  practical  j^ower,  and  the  means  by  which  tlie 
far-distant  races  of  the  world,  who  now  sit  in  darkness  and  the 
shadow  of  death,  are  to  he  reached  and  regenerated.  At  home 
or  far  away — the  call  is  equally  instant — here,  fur  want  of  more 
extended  physical  scien'ce,  there  is  plague  in  our  streets,  famine 
in  our  fields;  the  pest  strikes  root  and  fruit  over  a  hemisphere 
of  the  earth,  we  know  not  why  ;  the  voices  of  our  children  fade 
away  into  silence  of  venomous  death,  we  know  not  why  ;  the 
population  of  this  most  civilized  country  resists  every  effort  to 
lead  it  into  purity  of  habit  and  habitation — to  give  it  genuine- 
ness of  nourishment,  and  wholesomeness  of  air,  as  a  new  inter- 
ference with  its  liberty  ;  and  insists  vociferously  on  its  right  to 
helpless  death.  All  this  is  terrible  ;  but  it  is  more  terrible  yet 
that  dim,  phosphorescent,  frightful  superstitions  still  hold  their 
own  over  two-thirds  of  the  inhabited  globe,  and  that  all  the 
phenomena  of  nature  which  were  intended  by  the  Creator  to 
enforce  His  eternal  laws  of  love  and  judgment,  and  which, 
rightly  understood,  enforce  them  more  strongly  by  their  patient 
beneficence,  and  their  salutary  destructiveness,  than  the  miracu- 
lous dew  on  Gideon's  fleece,  or  the  restrained  lightnings  of 
IToreb — that  all  these  legends  of  God's  daily  dealing  with  His 
creatures  remain  unread,  or  are  read  backwards,  into  blind, 
hundred-armed  horror  of  idol  cosmogony. 

How  strange  it  seems  that  physical  science  should  ever  have 
been  thought  adverse  to  religion  !  The  pride  of  physical  science 
is,  indeed,  adverse,  like  every  other  pride,  both  to  religion  and 
truth  ;  but  sincerity  of  science,  so  far  from  being  hostile,  is  the 
path-maker  among  the  mountains  for  the  feet  of  those  who 
publish  peace. 

works,  of  which  those  on  infusoria  may  be  especially  noted  here.  He  was 
born  in  1795,  and  in  1842  was  elected  Principal  Secretary  to  the  Berlin 
Academy  of  Science,  which  post  he  held  till  his  death  in  1876.  The  late 
Sir  Walter  Calverley  Trevelyan,  Bart.,  will  also  be  remembered  in  con- 
nection with  the  study  of  natural  science,  as  well  as  for  his  efforts  in  phil- 
anthropy. He  died  in  March,  1879.  I  have  been  unable  to  find  any  further 
information  as  to  the  prize  mentioned  by  Mr.  Ruskiu,  or  as  to  the  essay 
which  obtained  it. 


134  LETTERS   O:^   ART.  [1859. 

'Now,  therefore,  and  now  only,  it  seems  to  me,  the  Univer- 
sity has  become  complete  in  her  fmiction  as  a  teacher  of  the 
yonth  of  the  nation  to  which  every  hour  gives  wider  authority 
over  distant  lands;  and  from  which  every  rood  of  extended 
dominion  demands  new,  various,  and  variously  applicable 
knowledge  of  the  laws  which  govern  the  constitution  of  the 
globe,  and  must  finally  regulate  the  industry,  no  less  than  dis- 
cipline the  intellect,  of  the  human  race.  I  can  hardly  turn  my 
mind  from  these  deep  causes  of  exultation  to  the  minor  diffi- 
culties which  beset  or  restrict  your  undertaking.  The  great 
work  is  accomplished ;  the  immediate  impression  made  by  it  is 
of  little  importance  ;  and  as  for  my  own  special  subjects  of 
thought  or  aim,  though  many  of  them  are  closely  involved  in 
what  has  been  done,  and  some  principles  which  I  believe  to  be, 
in  their  way,  of  great  importance,  are  awkwardly  compromised 
in  what  has  been  imperfectly  done — all  these  I  am  temj^ted 
to  waive,  or  content  to  compromise  when  only  I  know  that  the 
l3uilding  is  in  main  points  fit  for  its  mighty  work.  Yet  you 
will  not  think  that  it  was  matter  of  indifference  to  me  when  T 
saw,  as  I  went  over  Professor  Brodie's  ^  chemical  laboratories 
the  other  day,  how  closely  this  success  of  adaptation  was  con- 
nected with  the  choice  of  the  style.  It  was  very  touching  and 
wonderful  to  me.  Here  was  the  architecture  which  I  had 
learned  to  know  and  love  in  pensive  ruins,  deserted  by  the 
hopes  and  efforts  of  men,  or  in  dismantled  fortress-fragments 
recording  only  their  cruelty — here  was  this  very  architecture 
lending  itself,  as  if  created  only  for  these,  to  the  foremost 
activities  of  human  discovery,  and  the  tenderest  functions  of 
human  mercy.  No  other  architecture,  as  I  felt  in  an  instant, 
could  have  thus  adapted  itself  to  a  new  and  strange  office.  No 
fixed  arrangements  of  frieze  and  pillar,  nor  accej^ted  propor- 
tions of  wall  and  roof,  nor  practised  refinement  of  classical 
decoration,  could  have  otherwise  than  absurdly  and  fantastically 
yielded  its  bed  to  the  crucible,  and  its  blast  to  the  furnace ; 
but  these  old  vaultings  and  strong  buttresses — ready  always  to 

*  Mr.  Brodie,  who  succeeded  his  father  as  Sir  Benjamin  Brodie  in  1867, 
was  appointed  Professor  of  Chemistry  at  Oxford  in  1855. 


1859.]  THE    OXFORD    MUSEl'M.  135 

do  servico  to  man,  wliatcver  liis  bidding — to  sliake  the  waves 
of  war  back  from  his  seats  of  rock,  or  prolonged  througli  faint 
twilights  of  sanctuary,  the  sighs  of  liis  superstition — lie  had 
but  to  ask  it  of  them,  and  they  entered  at  once  into  the  lowliest 
ministries  of  the  arts  of  healing,  and  the  sternest  and  clearest 
ottices  in  the  service  of  science. 

And  the  longer  I  examined  the  Museum  arrangements,  the 
more  I  felt  that  it  could  be  oidy  some  accidental  delay  in  the 
recognition  of  this  efficiency  for  its  work  which  had  caused  any 
feeling  adverse  to  its  j^rogress  among  the  members  of  the  Uni- 
versity. The  general  idea  about  the  Museum  has  perhaps  been, 
hitherto,  that  it  is  a  forced  endeavor  to  bring  decorative  forms 
of  architecture  into  uncongenial  uses  ;  whereas,  the  real  fact  is, 
as  far  as  I  can  discern  it,  that  no  other  architecture  would,  under 
the  required  circumstances,  have  been  i)os^if>le  j  and  that  any 
effort  to  introduce  classical  types  of  form  into  these  laboratories 
and  museums  must  have  ended  in  ludicrous  discomliture.  But 
the  building  has  now  reached  a  point  of  crisis,  and  it  depends 
upon  the  treatment  which  its  rooms  now  receive  in  completion, 
whether  the  facts  of  their  propriety  and  utility  be  acknowledged 
by  the  public,  or  lost  sight  of  in  the  distraction  of  their  atten- 
tion to  matters  wholly  external. 

So  strongly  I  feel  this,  that,  whatever  means  of  decoration 
had  been  at  your  disposal,  I  should  have  been  inclined  to 
recommend  an  exceeding  reserve  in  that  matter.  Pei-haps  I 
should  even  have  desired  such  reserve  on  abstract  grounds  of 
feeling.  The  study  of  x^atural  History  is  one  eminently  ad- 
dressed to  the  active  energies  of  body  and  mind.  Xothing  is 
to  be  got  out  of  it  by  dreaming,  not  always  much  by  thinking 
— everything  by  seeking  and  seeing.  It  is  Avork  for  the  hills 
and  fields, — work  of  foot  and  hand,  knife  and  hammer, — so  far 
as  it  is  to  be  afterwards  carried  on  in  the  house,  the  more  active 
and  workmanlike  our  proceedings  the  better,  fresh  aii'  bl(.)wing 
in  from  the  windows,  and  nothing  interfering  with  the  free 
space  for  our  shelves  and  insti-uments  on  the  walls.  I  am  not 
sure  that  much  interior  imagery  or  color,  or  other  exciting  ad- 
dress to  any  of  the  observant  faculties,  would  be  dcsiral)le  under 


136  LETTERS   0]S"   ART.  [1859. 

sucli  circumstances.  Yon  know  best ;  but  I  should  no  more 
think  of  painting  in  bright  colors  beside  you,  while  you  were 
dissecting  or  analyzing,  than  of  entertaining  you  by  a  concert 
of  fifes  and  cymbals. 

But  farther :  Do  you  suppose  Gothic  decoration  is  an  easy 
thing,  or  that  it  is  to  be  carried  out  with  a  certainty  of  success 
at  the  first  trial,  under  new  and  difilcult  conditions?  The 
system  of  the  Gothic  decorations  took  eight  hundred  years 
to  mature,  gathering  its  power  by  undivided  inheritance  of 
traditional  method,  and  unbroken  accession  of  systematic 
jDOwer ;  from  its  culminating  point  in  the  Sainte  Cbapelle,  it 
faded  through  four  hundred  years  of  splendid  decline ;  now 
for  two  centuries  it  has  lain  dead — and  more  than  so — buried  ; 
and  more  than  so,  forgotten,  as  a  dead  man  out  of  mind  ;  do 
you  expect  to  revive  it  out  of  those  retorts  and  furnaces  of 
yours,  as  the  cloud-spirit  of  the  Arabian  sea  rose  from  beneatli 
the  seals  of  Solomon  ?  Perhaps  I  have  been  myself  faultfully 
answerable  for  this  too  eager  hope  in  your  mind  (as  well  as 
in  that  of  others)  by  what  I  have  urged  so  often  respecting  the 
duty  of  bringing  out  the  power  of  subordinate  workmen  in 
decorative  design.  But  do  you  think  I  meant  workmen 
trained  (or  untrained)  in  the  way  that  ours  have  been  until 
lately,  and  then  cast  loose  on  a  sudden,  into  unassisted  conten- 
tions with  unknown  elements  of  style  ?  I  meant  the  precise 
contrary  of  this ;  I  meant  workmen  as  we  have  yet  to  create 
them  :  men  inheriting  the  instincts  of  their  craft  through  many 
generations,  rigidly  trained  in  every  mechanical  art  that  bears 
on  their  materials,  and  familiarized  from  infancy  with  every 
condition  of  their  beautiful  and  perfect  treatment ;  informed 
and  refined  in  manhood,  by  constant  observation  of  all  natural 
fact  and  form  ;  then  classed,  according  to  their  proved  capaci- 
ties, in  ordered  companies,  in  which  every  man  shall  know  his 
part,  and  take  it  calmly  and  w^ithout  effort  or  doubt, — indisput- 
ably well,  unaccusabJy  accomplished, — mailed  and  weaponed 
cajp-d-jne  for  his  place  and  function.  Can  you  lay  your  hand 
on  such  men  ?  or  do  you  think  that  mere  natural  good-will  and 
good-feeling  can  at  once  supply  their  place  ?     Not  so  :  and  the 


1859.]  THE   OXFORD   MUSEUM.  137 

more  faithful  and  earnest  the  minds  you  liave  to  deal  witli,  the 
more  careful  you  should  be  not  to  urge  them  towards  fields  of 
effort,  in  which,  too  early  committed,  they  can  only  be  put  to 
unserviceable  defeat. 

Nor  can  you  hope  to  accomplish  by  rule  or  system  what 
cannot  be  done  by  individual  taste.  The  laws  of  color  are  de- 
finable up  to  certain  limits,  but  they  are  not  yet  defined.  So 
far  are  they  from  definition,  that  the  last,  and,  on  the  whole, 
best  work  on  the  subject  (Sir  Gardner  Wilkinson's)  declares 
the  "  color  concords'-  of  preceding  authors  to  be  discords,  and 
vice  versa* 

Much,  therefore,  as  I  love  color  decoration  when  it  is 
rightly  given,  and  essential  as  it  has  been  felt  by  the  great 
architects  of  all  periods  to  the  completion  of  their  work,  I 
would  not,  in  your  place,  endeavor  to  carry  out  such  decora- 
tion at  present,  in  any  elaborate  degree,  in  the  interior  of  the 
Museum.  Leave  it  for  future  thought ;  above  all,  try  no 
experiments.  Let  small  drawings  be  made  of  the  proposed 
arrangements  of  color  in  every  room ;  have  them  altered  on 
the  paper  till  you  feel  they  are  right ;  then  carry  them  out 
firmly  and  simply;  but,  observe,  with  as  delicate  execution 
as  possible.  Rough  work  is  good  in  its  place,  three  hundred 
feet  above  the  eye,  on  a  cathedral  front,  but  not  in  the  interior 
of  rooms,  devoted  to  studies  in  which  everything  depends  upon 
accuracy  of  touch  and  keenness  of  sight. 

With  respect  to  this  finishing,  by  the  last  touches  l)estowed 
on  the  sculpture  of  the  building,  I  feel  painfully  the  harmful- 
ness  of  any  ill-advised  parsimony  at  this  moment.  For  it  may, 
perhaps,  be  alleged  by  the  advocates  of  retrenchment,  that  so 
long  as  the  building  is  fit  for  its  uses  (and  your  report  is  con- 
clusive as  to  its  being  so),  economy  in  treattnent  of  external 
feature  is  perfectly  allowable,  and  will  in  nowise  diminish  the 
serviceableness  of  the  building  in  the  great  objects  which  its 
designs  regarded.  To  a  certain  extent  this  is  true.  You  have 
comfortable  rooms,  I  hope  sufficient  apparatus ;    and  it  now 

*  Sir  Gardner  Wilkinson's  book  "  On  Color  and  the  Diffusion  of  Taste" 
was  published  in  1858. 


138  LETTERS   ON  ART.  [1859. 

clej)eiids  miicli  more  on  the  professors  than  on  the  ornament: 
of  the  l)uilding,  whether  or  not  it  is  to  become  a  bright  oi^ 
obscure  centre  of  public  instruction.  Yet  there  are  other 
points  to  be  considered.  As  the  building  stands  at  present, 
there  is  a  discouraging  aspect  of  parsimony  about  it.  One  sees 
that  the  architect  ]ias  done  the  utmost  he  could  with  the  means 
at  his  disposal,  and  that  just  at  the  point  of  reaching  what  was 
right,  he  has  been  stopped  for  want  of  funds.  This  is  visible 
in  almost  every  stone  of  the  edifice.  It  separates  it  with  broad 
distinctiveness  from  all  the  other  buildings  in  the  University. 
It  may  be  seen  at  once  that  our  other  public  institutions,  and 
all  our  colleges — though  some  of  them  simply  designed — are 
yet  richly  built,  never  pinchingly.  Pieces  of  princely  costli- 
ness, every  here  and  there,  mingle  among  the  simplicities  or 
severities  of  the  student's  life.  What  practical  need,  for 
instance,  have  we  at  Christchurch  of  the  beautiful  fan-vaulting 
under  which  we  ascend  to  dine?  We  might  have  as  easily 
achieved  the  eminence  of  our  banquets  under  a  plain  vault. 
What  need  have  the  readers  in  the  Bodleian  of  the  ribbed 
traceries  which  decorate  its  external  walls?  Yet,  which  of 
those  readers  would  not  think  that  learning  was  insulted  by 
their  removal  ?  And  are  there  any  of  the  students  of  Balliol 
devoid  of  gratitude  for  the  kindly  munificence  of  the  man 
who  gave  them  the  beautiful  sculptured  brackets  of  their  oriel 
window,  when  three  massy  projecting  stones  would  have 
answered  the  purpose  just  as  well  ?  In  these  and  also  other 
regarded  and  pleasant  portions  of  our  colleges,  we  find  always 
a  wealthy  and  worthy  completion  of  all  appointed  features, 
which  I  believe  is  not  without  strong,  though  untraced  effect, 
on  the  minds  of  the  j^ounger  scholars,  giving  them  respect  for 
the  branches  of  learning  which  these  buildings  are  intended  to 
honor,  and  increasing,  in  a  certain  degree,  that  sense  of  the 
value  of  delicacy  and  accuracy  which  is  the  first  condition  of 
advance  in  those  branches  of  learning  themselves. 

Your  Museum,  if  you  now  bring  it  to  hurried  completion, 
will  convey  an  impression  directly  the  reverse  of  this.  It  will 
have  the  look  of  a  j)lace,  not  where  a  revered  system  of  instruc- 


1859.]  THE    OXFOFU)    ML'SKIM.  139 

"''Oil  is  established,  but  mIrtc  an  unadvised  experiment  is  being 
'lisadvantageously  attempted.  It  is  yet  in  yuur  power  to  avoid 
tliis,  and  to  make  the  edifice  as  noble  in  aspect  as  in  function. 
AVhatever  chance  there  may  be  of  failure  in  interior  work, 
rich  ornamentation  may  be  given,  without  any  chance  of 
failure,  to  just  that  portion  of  the  exterior  which  will  give 
pleasure  to  every  passer-by,  and  express  the  meaning  of  the 
building  best  to  the  eyes  of  strangers.  There  is,  I  repeat,  no 
chance  of  serious  failure  in  this  external  decoration,  because 
your  architect  has  at  his  command  the  aid  of  men,  such  as 
worked  with  the  architects  of  past  times.  Not  only  has  the 
art  of  Gothic  scul])ture  in  part  remained,  though  that  of  Gothic 
color  has  been  long  lost,  but  the  unselfish — and,  I  regret  to  say, 
in  part  self-saci-ilicing — zeal  of  two  lirst-rate  sculptors,  Mr. 
Munro  and  Mr.  AVoolrier,  which  has  already  given  you  a  series 
of  noble  statues,  is  still  at  your  disposal,  to  head  and  systematize 
the  efforts  of  inferior  workmen. 

I  do  not  know  if  you  will  attribute  it  to  a  higher  estimate 
than  yours  of  the  genius  of  the  O'Shea  family,"  or  to  a  lower 
estimate  of  what  they  have  as  yet  accomplished,  that  I  believe 
tliey  will,  as  they  proceed,  produce  much  better  ornamental 
sculpture  than  any  at  present  completed  in  the  Museum.  It 
is  also  to  be  remembered  that  sculptors  are  able  to  work  for  us 
with  a  directness  of  meaning  which  none  of  our  painters  could 
bring  to  their  task,  even  were  they  disposed  to  help  us.  A 
painter  is  scarcely  excited  to  his  strength,  but  by  subjects  full 
of  circumstance,  such  as  it  would  be  ditficult  to  suggest  appro- 
priately in  the  present  building ;  but  a  sculptor  has  room 
enough  for  his  full  power  in  the  portrait  statues,  which  are 
necessarily  the  leading  features  of  good  Gothic  decoration. 
Let  me  pray  you,  therefore,  so  far  as  you  have  influence  with 
the  delegacy,  to  entreat  their  favorable  consideration  of  the 
project  stated  in  Mr.  GreswelTs  appeal — the  enrichment  of  the 
doorway,  and  the  completion  of  the  sculpture  of  the  AVest 
Front.     There  is  a  reason  for  desiring  such  a  plan  to  be  carried 

*  See  note  to  p.  142. 


140  LETTEKS   ON   ART.  [1859. 

out,  of  wider  reach  than  any  bearing  on  the  interests  of  the 
Museum  itself.  I  believe  that  the  elevation  of  all  arts  in  Eno:- 
land  to  their  true  dignity,  depends  principally  on  our  recover- 
ing that  unity  of  purpose  in  sculptors  and  architects,  which 
characterized  the  designers  of  all  great  Christian  buildings. 
Sculpture,  separated  from  architecture,  always  degenerates 
into  effeminacies  and  conceits ;  architecture,  stripped  of  sculp- 
ture, is  at  best  a  convenient  arrangement  of  dead  walls; 
associated,  they  not  only  adorn,  but  reciprocally  exalt  each 
other,  and  give  to  all  the  arts  of  the  country  in  which  they 
thus  exist,  a  correspondent  tone  of  majesty. 

But  I  would  plead  for  the  enrichment  of  this  doorway  by 
portrait  sculpture,  not  so  much  even  on  any  of  these  important 
grounds,  as' because  it  would  be  the  first  example  in  modern 
English  architecture  of  the  real  value  and  right  place  of 
commemorative  statues.  We  seem  never  to  know  at  present 
where  to  put  such  statues.  In  the  midst  of  the  blighted  trees 
of  desolate  squares,  or  at  the  crossings  of  confused  streets,  or 
balanced  on  the  pinnacles  of  pillars,  or  riding  across  the  tops  of 
triumphal  arches,  or  blocking  up  the  aisles  of  cathedrals — in 
none  of  these  positions,  I  think,  does  the  portrait  statue  answer 
its  purpose.  It  may  be  a  question  whether  the  erection  of 
such  statues  is  honorable  to  the  erectors,  but  assuredly  it  is  not 
honorable  to  the  persons  whom  it  pretends  to  commemorate ; 
nor  is  it  any  wise  matter  of  exultation  to  a  man  who  has 
deserved  well  of  his  country  to  reflect  that  he  may  one  day 
encumber  a  crossing,  or  disfigure  a  park  gate.  But  there  is  no 
man  of  worth  or  heart  who  would  not  feel  it  a  high  and  price- 
less reward  that  his  statue  should  be  placed  where  it  might 
remind  the  youth  of  England  of  what  had  been  exemplary  in 
his  life,  or  useful  in  his  labors,  and  might  be  regarded  with  no 
empty  reverence,  no  fruitless  pensiveness,  but  with  the  emula- 
tive, eager,  unstinted  passionateness  of  honor,  which  youth 
pays  to  the  dead  leaders  of  the  cause  it  loves,  or  discoverers  of 
the  light  by  which  it  lives.  To  be  buried  under  weight  of 
marble,  or  with  splendor  of  ceremonial,  is  still  no  more  than 
burial ;  but  to  be  remembered  daily,  with  profitable  tenderness, 
by  the  activest  intelligences  of  the  nation  we  have  served,  and 


1859.]  THE   OXFORD    MUSEUM.  141 

to  have  power  granted  even  to  the  sliadows  of  the  poor  feat- 
ures, sunk  into  dust,  still  to  warn,  to  animate,  to  command,  as 
the  father's  brow  i-ules  and  exalts  the  toil  of  his  children. 
This  is  not  burial,  but  immortality. 

There  is,  however,  another  kind  of  portraiture,  already 
richly  introduced  in  the  works  of  the  Museum  ;  the  portraiture, 
namely,  of  flowers  and  animals,  respecting  which  I  must  ask 
you  to  let  me  say  a  few  selfish,  no  less  than  congratulatory 
words — selfish,  inasmuch  as  they  bear  on  this  visible  exposition 
of  a  principle  which  it  has  long  been  one  of  my  most  earnest 
aims  to  maintain.  We  English  call  ourselves  a  practical 
people ;  but,  nevertheless,  there  are  some  of  our  best  and  most 
general  instincts  which  it  takes  us  half-centuries  to  put  into 
practice.  Probably  no  educated  Englishman  or  Englishwoman 
has  ever,  for  the  last  forty  years,  visited  Scotland,  with  leisure 
on  their  hands,  Avithout  making  a  pilgrimage  to  Melrose ;  nor 
have  they  ever,  I  suppose,  accomplished  the  pilgrimage  with 
out  singing  to  themselves  the  burden  of  Scott's  description  of 
the  Abbey.  Xor  in  that  description  (may  it  not  also  be  con- 
jectured ?)  do  they  usually  feel  any  couplets  more  deeply  than 

the— 

'  *  Spreading  herbs  and  flowerets  bright 
Glistened  with  the  dew  of  night. 
No  herb  nor  floweret  glistened  there 
But  was  carved  in  the  cloister  arches  as  fair." 

And  yet,  though  we  are  raising  every  year  in  England  new 
examples  of  every  kind  of  costly  and  variously  intended  build- 
ings,— ecclesiastical,  civil,  and  domestic, — none  of  us,  through 
all  that  period,  had  boldness  enough  to  put  the  pretty  couplets 
into  simple  practice.  We  wxnt  on,  even  in  the  best  Gothic 
work  we  attempted,  clumsily  copying  the  rudest  ornaments  of 
previous  buildings ;  we  never  so  much  as  dreamed  of  learning 
from  the  monks  of  Melrose,  and  seeking  for  help  beneath  the 
dew  that  sparkled  on  their  "gude  kail"  garden.''^ 

*  "  The  monks  of  Melrose  made  good  kail 
On  Friday,  when  they  fasted." 
The  kail  leaf  is  the  one  principal!}'  employed  in  the  decorations  of  the 
abbey.     (Original  note  to  "The  Oxford  Museum,"  p.  83.) 


142  LETTERS   OK   AET.  [1859. 

Your  Museum  at  Oxford  is  literally  the  first  building  raised 
in  England  since  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century,  which  has 
fearlessly  put  to  new  trial  this  old  faith  in  nature,  and  in  the 
genius  of  the  unassisted  workman,  who  gathered  out  of  nature 
the  materials  he  needed.  I  am  entirely  glad,  therefore,  that 
you  have  decided  on  engraving  for  pubhcation  one  of  O'Shea's 
capitals  ;^  it  will  be  a  complete  type  of  the  whole  work,  in  its 
inner  meaning,  and  far  better  to  show  one  of  them  in  its  com- 
pleteness than  to  give  any  reduced  sketch  of  the  building. 
Kevertheless,  beautiful  as  that  capital  is,  and  as  all  the  rest  of 
O'Shea's  work  is  likely  to  be,  it  is  not  yet  perfect  Gothic 
sculpture ;  and  it  might  give  rise  to  dangerous  error,  if  the 
admiration  given  to  these  carvings  were  unqualified. 

I  cannot,  of  course,  enter  in  this  letter  into  any  discussion 
of  the  question,  more  and  more  vexed  among  us  daily,  respect- 
ing the  due  meaning  and  scope  of  conventionalism  in  treat- 
ment of  natural  form ;  but  I  may  state  briefly  what,  I  trust, 
will  be  the  conclusion  to  which  all  this  ''  vexing"  will  at  last 
lead  our  best  architects. 

The  highest  art  in  all  kinds  is  that  which  conveys  the  most 
truth ;  and  the  best  ornamentation  possible  would  be  the  paint- 
ing of  interior  walls  with  frescos  by  Titian,  representing 
perfect  Humanity  in  color;  and  the  sculpture  of  exterior  walls 
by  Phidias,  representing  perfect  Humanity  in  form.  Titian 
and  Phidias  are  precisely  alike  in  their  conception  and  treat- 
ment of  nature — everlasting  standards  of  the  right. 

Beneath  ornamentation,  such  as  men  like  these  could 
bestow,  falls  in  various  rank,  according  to  its  subordination  to 
vulgar  uses  or  inferior  places,  what  is  commonly  conceived  as 
ornamental  art.  The  lower  its  office,  and  the  less  tractable  its 
material,  the  less  of  nature  it  should  contain,  until  a  zigzag 

*  This  engraving,  which  formed  the  frontispiece  of  "  The  Oxford 
Museum,"  will  be  found  facing  the  title-page  of  the  present  volume,  the 
original  plate  having  proved  m  excellent  condition.  O'Shea  was,  together 
with  others  of  his  name  and  family,  amongst  the  principal  workmen  on 
the  building.  The  capital  represents  the  following  ferns:  the  common 
hart's-tongue  (scolopendrium  vulgare),  the  northern  hard-fern  (blechnum 
boreale),  and  the  male  fern  (tilix  mas). 


1859.]  THE   OXFORD   MUSEUM.  U3 

becomes  the  best  ornament  for  the  hem  of  a  robe,  and  a  mosaic 
of  bits  of  glass  the  best  design  for  a  colored  window.  But  all 
these  forms  of  lower  art  are  to  be  conventional  only  because 
they  are  subordinate — not  because  conventionalism  is  in  itself 
a  good  or  desirable  thing.  All  right  conventionalism  is  a  wise 
acceptance  of,  and  com))liance  with,  conditions  of  restraint  or 
inferiority ;  it  may  be  inferiority  of  our  knowledge  or  power, 
as  in  the  art  of  a  semi-savage  nation ;  or  restraint  by  reason  of 
material,  as  in  the  way  the  glass  painter  should  restrict  himself 
to  transparent  hue,  and  a  sculptor  deny  himself  the  eyelash  and 
the  film  of  flowino:  hair,  which  he  cannot  cut  in  nuirble :  but 
in  all  cases  whatever,  right  conventionalism  is  either  a  wise 
acceptance  of  an  inferior  place,  or  a  noble  display  of  power 
under  accepted  limitation  ;  it  is  not  an  improvement  of  natural 
form  into  something  better  or  purer  than  Nature  herself. 

Now  this  great  and  most  precious  principle  may  be  compro- 
mised in  two  quite  opposite  wa^'s.  It  is  compromised  on  one 
side  when  men  suppose  that  the  degradation  of  a  natural  form 
which  fits  it  for  some  subordinate  place  is  an  improvement  of 
it ;  and  that  a  black  profile  on  a  red  ground,  because  it  is  proper 
on  a  water-jug,  is  therefore  an  idealization  of  Humanity,  and 
nobler  art  than  a  picture  of  Titian.  And  it  is  compromised 
equally  gravely  on  the  opposite  side,  when  men  refuse  to  sub- 
mit to  the  limitation  of  material  and  the  fitnesses  of  office — 
when  they  try  to  produce  finished  pictures  in  colored  glass,  or 
substitute  the  inconsiderate  imitation  of  natural  objects  for  the 
perfcctness  of  adapted  and  disciplined  design. 

There  is  a  tendency  in  the  work  of  the  Oxford  Museum  to 
err  on  this  last  side ;  unavoidable,  indeed,  in  the  present  state 
of  our  art-knowledge — and  less  to  be  regretted  in  a  building 
devoted  to  natural  science  than  in  any  other :  nevertheless,  I 
cannot  close  this  letter  without  pointing  it  out,  and  warning  the 
general  reader  against  supposing  that  the  ornamentation  of  the 
Museum  is,  or  can  be  as  yet,  a  representation  of  what  Gothic 
work  will  be,  when  its  revival  is  complete.  Far  more  severe, 
yet  more  perfect  and  lovely,  that  work  will  involve,  under 
sterner  conventional  restraint,  the  expression  not  only  of  natu- 


144 


LETTERS   ON   ART. 


[1859. 


ral  form,  but  of  all  vital  and  noble  natural  law.  For  the  truth 
of  decoration  is  never  to  be  measured  by  its  imitative  power, 
but  by  its  suggestive  and  informative  power.     In  the  annexed 


[From  •'  The  Oxford  Museum,"  p.  89.1 

spandril  of  the  iron-work  of  our  roof,  for  instance,  the  horse- 
chestnut  leaf  and  nut  are  used  as  the  principal  elements  of 
form  ;  they  are  not  ill-arranged,  and  produce  a  more  agreeable 


1857.]  THE   CASTLE    ROCK.  145 

effect  than  convolutions  of  tlie  iron  could  have  given,  unhclped 
by  any  reference  to  natural  objects.  Xevertheless,  I  do  not 
call  it  an  absolutely  good  design ;  for  it  would  have  been  pos- 
sible, with  far  severer  conventional  treatment  of  the  iron  bars, 
and  stronger  constructive  an-angement  of  them,  to  have  given 
vigorous  expression,  not  of  the  shapes  of  leaves  and  nuts  only, 
but  of  their  peculiar  radiant  or  fanned  expansion,  and  other 
conditions  of  group  and  growth  in  the  tree  ;  which  would  have 
been  just  the  more  beautiful  and  interesting,  as  they  would 
have  arisen  from  deeper  research  into  nature,  and  more  adaptive 
modifying  power  in  the  designer's  mind,  than  the  mere  leaf 
termination  of  a  riveted  scroll. 

I  am  compelled  to  name  these  deliciencies,  in  order  to  pre- 
vent misconception  of  the  principles  we  are  endeavoring  to 
enforce ;  but  I  do  not  name  them  as  at  present  to  be  avoided, 
or  even  much  to  be  regretted.  They  are  not  chargeable  either 
on  the  architect,  or  on  the  subordinate  workmen ;  but  only  on 
the  system  which  has  for  three  centuries  withheld  all  of  us 
from  healthy  study ;  and  although  I  doubt  not  that  lovelier 
and  juster  expressions  of  the  Gothic  principle  will  be  ultimately 
aimed  at  by  us,  than  any  which  are  possible  in  the  Oxford 
Museum,  its  builders  will  never  lose  their  claim  to  our  chief 
gratitude,  as  the  lirst  guides  in  a  right  direction ;  and  the  build- 
ing itself — the  first  exponent  of  the  recovered  truth — will  only 
be  the  more  venerated  the  more  it  is  excelled. 
Believe  me,  my  dear  Acland, 

Ever  affectionately  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 


[From  "The  Wi'ness"  (Edinburgh),  September  16, 1857.] 

THE    CASTLE  ROCK. 

Dunbar,  \4ith  September,  1857. 
To  the  Editor  of  "  TJie  Witneisa." 

My  dear  Sir:  As  I  was  leaving  Edinburgh  this  morning, 

I  heard  a  report  which  gave  me  more  concern  than  I  can  easily 


146  LETTERS    OX    ART.  [1857. 

express,  and  very  sufficiently  spoiled  the  pleasure  of  my  drive 
here.  If  there  be  no  truth  in  the  said  report,  of  course  take  no 
notice  of  this  letter ;  but  if  there  be  real  ground  for  my  fears, 
I  trust  you  will  allow  me  space  in  your  columns  for  a  few 
words  on  the  subject. 

The  whisper — I  hope  I  may  say,  the  calumny — regarded 
certain  proceedings  which  are  taking  place  at  the  Castle.  It 
was  said  to  be  the  architect's  intention  to  cut  down  into  the 
brow  of  the  Castle  rock,  in  order  to  afford  secure  foundation 
for  some  new  buildings."^ 

Now,  the  Castle  rock  of  Edinburgh  is,  as  far  as  I  know, 
simply  the  noblest  in  Scotland  conveniently  approachable  by 
any  creatures  but  sea-gulls  or  peewits.  Ailsa  and  the  Bass  are 
of  course  more  wonderful ;  and,  I  suppose,  in  the  West  High- 
lands there  are  masses  of  crag  more  wild  and  fantastic ;  but 
people  only  go  to  see  these  once  or  twice  in  their  lives,  while 
the  Castle  rock  has  a  daily  influence  in  forming  the  taste,  or 
kindling  the  imagination,  of  every  promising  youth  in  Edin- 
burgh. Even  irrespectively  of  its  position,  it  is  a  mass  of 
singular  importance  among  the  rocks  of  Scotland.  It  is  not 
easy  to  find  among  your  mountains  a  "  craig"  of  so  definite  a 
iovrn,  and  on  so  magnificent  a  scale.  Among  the  central  hills 
of  Scotland,  from  Ben  Wyvis  to  the  Lammermuirs,  I  know  of 
none  comparable  to  it ;  while,  besides  being  bold  and  vast,  its 
bars  of  basalt  are  so  nobly  arranged,  and  form  a  series  of  curves 
at  once  so  majestic  and  harmonious,  from  the  turf  at  their  base 
to  the  roots  of  the  bastions,  that,  as  long  as  your  artists  have 
that  crag  to  study,  I  do  not  see  that  they  need  casts  from  Michael 
Angelo,  or  any  one  else,  to  teach  them  the  laws  of  composition 
or  the  sources  of  sublimity. 

But  if  you  once  cut  into  the  brow  of  it,  all  is  over.  Dis- 
turb, in  any  single  point,  the  simple  lines  in  w^hich  the  walls 
now  advance  and  recede  upon  the  tufted  grass  of  its  summit, 
and  you  may  as  well  make  a  quarry  of  it  at  once,  and  blast 
away  rock,  Castle,  and  all.     It  admits  of  some  question  whether 

*  A  new  armory  ^Yas  to  be  added  to  the  Castle. 


1857.]  EDINBURGH   CASTLE.  147 

the  changes  made  in  the  architecture  of  jour  city  of  late  yeai-s 
are  in  every  case  improvements ;  but  very  certainly  you  cannot 
improve  the  architecture  of  your  volcanic  crags  hy  any  exi)lo- 
sive  retouches.  And  your  error  will  be  wholly  irremediable. 
You  may  restore  Trinity  Chapel,  or  repudiate  its  restoration,  at 
your  pleasure,  but  there  will  be  no  need  to  repudiate  restoration 
of  the  Castle  rock.  You  cannot  re-face  nor  re-rivet  that,  nor 
order  another  in  a  "similar  style."  It  is  a  dangerous  kind  of 
engraving  which  you  practise  on  so  large  a  jewel.  But  I  trust 
I  am  wasting:  mv  time  in  writino-  of  this :  I  cannot  believe  the 
1-eport,  nor  think  that  the  people  of  Edinburgh,  usually  so  proud 
of  their  city,  are  yet  so  unaware  of  what  constitutes  its  chief 
nobleness,  and  so  utterly  careless  of  the  very  features  of  its 
scenei-y,  which  have  been  the  means  of  the  highest  and  puivst 
education  to  their  greatest  men,  as  to  allow  this  rock  to  be 
touched.  If  the  works  are  confined  to  the  inside  of  the  wall, 
no  harm  will  be  done  ;  but  let  a  single  buttress,  or  a  single  cleft, 
encumber  or  divide  its  outer  brow,  and  there  is  not  a  man  of 
sensibility  or  sense  in  Edinburgh  who  will  not  blush  and  grieve 
for  it  as  long  as  he  lives. 

Believe  me,  my  dear  Sir,  very  faithfully  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 


IFrom  "  The  Witness"  (Edinburgh),  September  30, 1857.] 

EDINBURGH  CASTLE. 

Penrith,  27th  September. 
To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Witness:' 

My  dear  Sir:  I  see  by  some  remarks  in  the  Literary 
Gazdte'^  on  the  letter  of  mine  to  which  you  gave  a  place  in  your 
columns  of  the  lOth,  that  the  design  of  the  proposed  additions 
to  Edinburgh  Castle  is  receiving  really  serious  consideration. 

*  The  Literary  Gazette  of  September  26.  1857,  after  quoting  a  great  part 
of  the  previous  letter,  stated  that  the  new  armory  was  not  to  be  built  with- 
out all  due  regard  to  the  preservation  of  the  rock,  and  that  there  was  there- 
fore no  real  cause  for  alarm. 


148  LETTERS   OK   ART.  [1857. 

Perhaps,  therefore,  a  few  words  respecting  the  popular  but 
usually  unprofitable  business  of  castle-building  may  be  of  some 
interest  to  your  readers.  We  are  often  a  little  confused  in  our 
ideas  respecting  the  nature  of  a  castle — properly  so  called.  A 
"castle"  is  a  fortified  dwelling-house  containing  accommodation 
for  as  many  retainers  as  are  needed  completely  to  defend  its 
position.  A  "fortress"  is  a  fortified  military  position,  gen- 
erally understood  to  be  extensive  enough  to  contain  large 
bodies  of  troops.  And  a  "  citadel,"  a  fortified  mihtary  position 
connected  with  a  fortified  town,  and  capable  of  holding  out 
even  if  the  town  were  taken. 

It  is  as  well  to  be  clear  on  these  points :  for  certain  condi- 
tions of  architecture  are  applicable  and  beautiful  in  each  case, 
according  to  the  use  and  character  of  the  building  ;  and  certain 
other  conditions  are  in  like  manner  inapplicable  and  ugly, 
because  contrary  to  its  character,  and  unhelpful  to  its  use. 

IS'ow  this  helpfulness  and  unhelpfulness  in  architectural 
features  depends,  of  course,  primarily  on  the  military  practice 
of  the  time  ;  so  that  forms  which  were  grand,  because  rational, 
before  gunpowder  was  invented,  are  ignoble,  because  ridiculous, 
in  days  of  shell  and  shot.  The  very  idea  and  possibility  of  the 
castle  proper  have  passed  away  with  the  arms  of  the  middle  ages. 
A  man's  house  might  be  defended  by  his  servants  against  a  troop 
of  cavalry,  if  its  doors  were  solid  and  its  battlements  pierced. 
But  it  cannot  be  defended  against  a  couple  of  field-pieces,  what- 
ever the  thickness  of  its  oak,  or  number  of  its  arrow-slits. 

I  regret,  as  much  as  any  one  can  regret,  the  loss  of  castel- 
lated architecture  properly  so  called.  Nothing  can  be  more 
noble  or  interesting  than  the  true  thirteenth  or  fourteenth  cen- 
tury castle,  when  built  in  a  difficult  position,  its  builder  taking 
advantage  of  every  inch  of  ground  to  gain  more  room,  and  of 
every  irregularity  of  surface  for  purposes  of  outlook  and 
defence  ;  so  that  the  castle  sate  its  rock  as  a  strong  rider  sits  his 
horse — fitting  its  limbs  to  every  writhe  of  the  flint  beneath  it ; 
and  fringing  the  mountain  promontory  far  into  the  sky  with 
the  wild  crests  of  its  fantastic  battlements.  Of  such  castles  w^e 
can  see  no  more ;  and  it  is  just  because  I  know  them  well  and 


1S57.]  EDINBURGH   CASTLE.  140 

love  them  deeply  that  I  say  so.  I  know  that  their  power  and 
dignity  consists,  just  as  a  soldier's  consists,  in  their  knowing 
and  doing  their  work  thoroughly;  in  their  being  advanced  on 
edge  or  lifted  on  peak  of  crag,  not  for  show  nor  pride,  but  for 
due  guard  and  outlook  ;  and  that  all  their  beautiful  irregulari- 
ties and  apparent  caprices  of  form  are  in  reality  their  fullil- 
ments  of  need,  made  beautiful  by  their  compelled  association 
with  the  wild  strength  and  grace  of  the  natural  rock.  All 
attempts  to  imitate  them  now  are  useless — mere  girl's  play. 
Mind,  T  like  girl's  play,  and  child's  play,  in  its  place,  but  not 
in  the  planning  of  military  buildings.  Child's  play  in  many 
cases  is  the  truest  wisdom.  I  accept  to  the  full  the  truth  of 
those  verses  of  Wordsworth's'-  l)egiiming — 

"  Who  fancied  -svhat  a  pretty  sight 
This  rock  would  be,  if  edged  around 
With  living  snowdrops? — circlet  bright! 
How  glorious  to  this  orchard  ground  I 
Was  it  the  humor  of  a  child?"  etc. 

But  I  cannot  apply  the  same  principles  to  more  serious 
matters,  and  vary  the  reading  of  the  verses  into  application  to 
the  works  on  Edinburgh  Castle,  thus : 

"  Who  fancied  what  a  pretty  sight 
This  rock  would  be,  if  edged  around 
With  tiny  turrets,  pierced  and  light. 
How  glorious  to  this  warlike  ground!" 

Therefore,  though  I  do  not  know  exactly  what  you  have  got 
to  do  in  Edinburgh  Castle,  whatever  it  may  be,  I  am  certain 
the  only  right  way  to  do  it  is  the  plain  way.  Build  what  is 
needed — chapel,  barracks,  or  dwelling-house — in  the  best  places, 
in  a  military  point  of  view,  of  dark  stone,  and  bomb-proof, 
keeping  them  low,  and  within  the  existing  line  of  ramparts. 

*  "Poems  of  the  Fancy,"  xiv.  (1803).     The  quotation  omits  two  lines 

after  the  fourth: 

"  Who  loved  the  Uttle  rock,  and  set 
Upon  its  head  this  coronet!'" 

The  second  stanza  then  begins:  "Was  it  the  humor  of  a  child?"  etc. 


160  LETTERS   OK   ART.  1857. 

That  is  the  rational  thing  to  do ;  and  the  inliabitants  of  Edin- 
burgh will  find  it  in  the  end  the  picturesque  thing.  It  would 
be  so  under  any  circumstances ;  but  it  is  esj^ecially  so  in  this 
instance ;  for  the  grandeur  of  Edinburgh  Castle  depends  emi- 
nently on  the  great,  unbroken,  yet  beautifully  varied  parabolic 
curve  in  which  it  descends  from  the  Round  Tower  on  the  Castle 
Hill  to  the  terminating  piece  of  impendent  precipice  on  the 
north.  It  is  the  last  grand  feature  of  Edinburgh  left  as  yet 
uninjured.  You  have  filled  up  your  valley  with  a  large  chim- 
ney, a  mound,  and  an  Institution ;  broken  in  upon  the  Old  Town 
with  a  Bank,  a  College,  and  several  fires ;  dwarfed  the  whole 
of  Princes  Street  by  the  Scott  Monument ;  and  cut  Arthur's 
Seat  in  half  by  the  Queen's  Drive.  It  only  remains  for  you  to 
spoil  the  curve  of  your  Castle,  and  your  illustrations  of  the 
artistic  principle  of  breadth  will  be  complete. 

It  may  appear  at  first  that  I  depart  from  the  rule  of  use- 
fulness I  have  proj)Osed,  in  entreating  for  the  confinement  of 
all  buildings  undertaken  within  the  existing  ramparts,  in  order 
to  preserve  the  contour  of  the  outside  rock.  But  I  presume 
that  in  the  present  state  of  military  science,  and  of  European 
politics,  Edinburgh  Castle  is  not  a  very  important  military 
position  ;  and  that  to  make  it  a  serviceable  fortress  or  citadel, 
many  additional  works  would  be  required,  seriously  interfering 
with  the  convenience  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  New  Town,  and 
with  the  arrangements  of  the  Railroad  Company.  And,  as 
long  as  these  subordinate  works  are  not  carried  out,  I  do  not 
see  any  use  in  destroying  your  beautiful  rock,  merely  to  bring 
another  gun  to  bear,  or  give  accommodation  to  another  com- 
pany. But  I  both  see,  and  would  earnestly  endeavor  to  advo- 
cate, the  propriety  of  keeping  the  architecture  of  the  building 
within  those  ramparts  masculine  and  simple  in  style,  and  of  not 
allowing  a  mistaken  conception  of  picturesqueness  to  make  a 
noble  fortress  look  like  a  child's  toy. 

Believe  me,  my  dear  Sir,  very  faithfully  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 


1871. J  CASTLES   AND   KENNELS.  151 

[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  December  22, 1871.] 
CASTLES  AXD  KENNELS 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daih/  Tilcyniph." 

Sir  :  I  was  astonished  the  otlier  day  by  your  article  on 
taverns,  but  never  yet  in  my  life  was  so  much  astonished  by 
anything  in  print  as  by  your  to-day's  article  on  castles. - 

I  am  a  castle-lover  of  the  truest  sort.  I  do  not  suppose 
anv  man  alive  has  felt  anvthinor  like  the  sorrow  or  answer  with 
which  I  have  watched  the  modern  destruction  by  railroad  and 
manufacture,  lielped  by  the  wicked  improvidence  of  our  great 
families,  of  half  the  national  memorials  of  England,  either 
actually  or  in  effect  and  power  of  association — as  Conway,  for 
instance,  now  vibrating  to  ruin  over  a  railroad  station.  For 
Warwick  Castle,  1  named  it  in  my  letter  of  last  October,  in 
'*  Fors  Clavigera,"t  as  a  type  of  the  architectural  treasures  of 

*  The  article  on  taverns  occurred  in  the  Daily  Telegraph  of  the  8th 
December,  and  commented  on  a  recent  meeting  of  the  Licensed  Victual- 
lers' Protection  Society.  There  was  also  a  short  article  upon  drunkenness 
as  a  cause  of  crime  in  the  Daili/  Telegraph  of  December  9 — referred  to  by 
Mr.  Ruskin  in  a  letter  which  will  be  found  in  the  second  volume  of  this 
book.  The  article  on  castles  concluded  with  an  appeal  for  public  sub- 
scriptions towards  the  restoration  of  Warwick  Castle,  then  recently 
destroyed  by  fire. 

f  The  passage  alluded  to  is  partly  as  follows.  "  It  happened  also,  which 
was  the  real  cause  of  my  bias  in  after-life,  that  my  father  had  a  real  love 
of  pictures.  .  .  .  Accordingly,  wherever  there  was  a  gallery  to  be  seen, 
we  stopped  at  the  nearest  town  for  the  night;  and  in  reverentcst  manner  I 
thus  saw  nearly  all  the  noblemen's  houses  in  England;  not  indeed  myself 
at  that  age  caring  for  the  pictures,  but  much  for  castles  and  ruins,  feeling 
more  and  more,  as  I  grew  older,  the  healthy  delight  of  uncovetous  admira- 
tion, and  perceiving,  as  soon  as  I  could  perceive  any  political  truth  at  all, 
that  it  was  probably  much  happier  to  live  in  a  small  house  and  have  "War- 
wick Castle  to  be  astonished  at,  than  to  live  in  Warwick  Castle,  and  have 
nothing  to  be  astonished  at ;  and  that,  at  all  events,  it  would  not  make 
Brunswick  Square  in  the  least  more  pleasantly  habitable  to  pull  Warwick 
Castle  down.  And,  at  this  day,  though  I  have  kind  invitations  enough  to 
visit  America,  I  could  not,  even  for  a  couple  of  mouths,  live  in  a  country 
so  miserable  »s  to  possess  no  castles." 


152  LETTERS   OX   ART.  [1871. 

this  England  of  ours  known  to  me  and  beloved  from  childhood 
to  this  hour. 

But,  Sir,  I  am  at  this  hour  endeavoring  to  find  work  and 
food  for  a  boy  of  seventeen,  one  of  eight  people — two  married 
couples,  a  woman  and  her  daughter,  and  this  boy  and  his  sister 
— who  all  sleep  together  in  one  room,  some  18  ft.  square,  in 
the  heart  of  London ;  and  you  call  upon  me  for  a  subscription 
to  help  to  rebuild  Warwick  Castle. 

Sir,  I  am  an  old  and  thoroughbred  Tory,  and  as  such  I  say, 
^'  If  a  noble  family  cannot  rebuild  their  own  castle,  in  God's 
name  let  them  live  in  the  nearest  ditch  till  they  can." 
I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Dec.  20. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  December  25, 1871.] 

VERONA  V.    WABWICK. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph:' 

Sir  :  Of  lodging  for  poor  and  rich  you  will  perhaps  permit 
a  further  word  or  two  from  me,  even  in  your  close  columns 
for  Christmas  morning.  You  think  me  inconsistent  because  I 
wanted  to  buy  Yerona,  and  do  not  want  to  restore  Warwick."^ 

I  wanted,  and  still  want,  to  buy  Yerona.  I  would  give 
half  my  fortune  to  buy  it  for  England,  if  any  other  people 
would  help  me.  But  I  would  buy  it,  that  what  is  left  of  it 
might  not  be  burned,  and  what  is  lost  of  it  not  restored.  It 
would  indeed  be  very  pleasant — not  to  me  only,  but  to  many 
other  sorrowful  persons — if  things  could  be  restored  when  we 
chose.  I  would  subscribe  willingly  to  restore,  for  instance,  the 
manger  wherein  the  King  of  Judah  lay  cradled  this  day  some 

*  In  a  second  article  upon  the  same  subject  the  Daily  Telegraph  had 
expressed  surprise  at  Mr.  Ruskin's  former  letter.  "Who  does  not  remem- 
ber," it  wrote,  "his  proposal  to  buy  Verona,  so  as  to  secure  from  decay  the 
glorious  monuments  in  it?" 


1871.]  NOTRE   DAME   DE   PARIS.  153 

years  since,  and  not  unwillingly  to  restore  tlie  poorer  cradle  of 
our  English  King-maker,  were  it  possible.  But  for  the  making 
of  a  new  manger,  to  be  exhibited  for  the  edification  of  the 
religious  Britisli  })ublic,  I  will  not  su])scribe.  Xo  ;  nor  for  the 
building  of  mock  castles,  or  mock  cathedrals,  or  mocks  of  any- 
thing. And  the  sum  of  what  I  have  to  say  in  this  present 
matter  may  be  put  in  few  words. 

As  an  antiquary — wliicli,  tliank  Heaven,  I  am — I  say, 
''  Part  of  Warwick  Castle  is  burnt — 'tis  pity.  Take  better 
care  of  the  rest.'' 

As  an  old  Tory — which,  thank  Heaven,  I  am — I  say, 
"Lord  Warwick's  house  is  burned.  Let  Lord  Warwick  build 
a  better  if  he  can — a  worse  if  he  must ;  but  in  any  case,  let 
him  neither  beg  nor  borrow." 

As  a  modern  renovator  and  Liberal — which,  thank  Heaven, 
I  am  not — I  would  say,  "  By  all  means  let  the  public  subscribe 
to  build  a  spick-and-span  new  Warwick  Castle,  and  let  the  pic- 
tures be  touched  up,  and  exhibited  by  gaslight ;  let  the  family 
live  in  the  back  rooms,  and  let  there  be  a  table  cVhote  in  the 
great  hall  at  two  and  six  every  day,  26\  6(Z.  a  head,  and  let  us 
have  Guy's  bowl  for  a  dinner  bell." 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

John  Ruskin. 
Denmark  Hill,  S.E,,  24ih  (for  25^/0  December. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  January  19,  1871.] 
"XOTBE  DAME  DE  PARISH 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir:  It  may  perhaps  be  interesting  to  some  of  your  readers, 
in  the  present  posture  of  affairs  round  Paris,  to  know,  as  far  as 
I  am  able  to  tell  them,  the  rank  which  the  Church  of  Xotre 
Dame  holds  among  architectural  and  historical  monuments. 

Xearly  every  great  church  in  France  has  some  merit  special 


154  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1872. 

to  itself ;  in  other  countries,  one  style  is  common  to  many  dis- 
tricts; in  France,  nearly  every  province  has  its  unique  and 
precious  monument. 

But  of  thirteenth-century  Gothic — the  most  perfect  archi- 
tectural style  north  of  the  Alps — there  is,  both  in  historical 
interest,  and  in  accomplished  perfectness  of  art,  one  unique 
monument — the  Sainte  Chapelle  of  Paris. 

As  examples  of  Gothic,  ranging  from  the  twelfth  to  the 
fourteenth  century,  the  cathedrals  of  Chartres,  Rouen,  Amiens, 
Rheims,  and  Bourges,  form  a  kind  of  cinque-foil  round  Notre 
Dame  of  Paris,  of  which  it  is  imjDOssible  to  say  which  is  the 
more  precious  petal ;  but  any  of  those  leaves  would  be  worth 
a  complete  rose  of  any  other  country's  work  except  Italy's. 
ISTothing  else  in  art,  on  the  surface  of  the  round  earth,  could 
represent  any  one  of  them,  if  destroyed,  or  be  named  as  of  any 
equivalent  value. 

Central  among  these,  as  in  jDosition,  so  in  its  school  of 
sculpture  ;  unequalled  in  that  sj)ecialty  but  by  the  porch  of  the 
north  transept  of  Pouen,  and,  in  a  somewhat  later  school,  by 
the  western  porches  of  Bourges ;  absolutely  unreplaceable  as 
a  pure  and  lovely  source  of  art  instruction  by  any  future 
energy  or  ingenuity,  stands — perhaps,  this  morning,  I  ought 
rather  to  write,  stood  * — IsTotre  Dame  of  Paris. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  RUSKIN. 


[From  "The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  March  16, 1872.] 

MB,  BUSKIN'S  INFLUENCE:  A  DEFENCE. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  receive  many  letters  just  now  requesting  me  to  take 
notice  of  the  new  theory  respecting  Turner's  work  put  forward 
by  Dr.  Liebreich  in  his  i-ecent  lecture  at  the  Poyal  Institu- 

*  This  letter,  it  will  be  noticed,  was  written  during  the  bombardment 
and  a  few  days  before  the  capitulation  of  Paris  in  1871. 


1873.]  MR.   ruskin's  influence.  155 

tion."  Will  you  peniiir  mo  to  observe  in  your  columns,  once 
for  all,  that  I  have  no  time  for  the  contradiction  of  the  various 
foolish  opinions  and  assertions  which  from  time  to  time  are 
put  forward  respecting  Turner  or  his  pictures?  All  that  is 
necessary  for  any  person  generally  interested  in  the  arts  to 
know  about  Turner  was  clearly  stated  in  ''  Modern  Painters" 
twenty  years  ago,  and  I  do  not  mean  to  state  it  again,  nor  to 
contradict  any  contradictions  of  it.  Dr.  Liebreich  is  an  ingen- 
ious and  zealous  scientilic  person.  The  public  may  derive 
nmch  beneiit  from  consulting  him  on  the  subject  of  spectacles 
— not  on  that  of  art. 

As  I  am  under  the  necessity  of  writing  to  you  at  any  rate, 
may  I  say  further  that  I  wish  your  critic  of  Mi*.  Eastlake's 
book  f  on  the  Gothic  revival  would  explain  what  he  means  by 


*  Ou  Friday,  March  8,  1872,  entitled  "Turner  and  Mulready— On  the 
Effect  of  certain  Faults  of  Vision  on  Painting,  with  especial  reference  to 
their  Works."  The  argument  of  the  lecturer,  and  distinguished  oculist, 
was  that  the  change  of  style  in  the  pictures  of  Turner  was  due  to  a  change 
in  his  eyes  which  developed  itself  during  the  last  twenty  years  of  his  life. 
(See  "Proceedings  of  the  Royal  Institution,"  1872,  vol.  vi.,  p.  450.) 

t  "AHistory  of  the  Gothic  Revival."  By  Charles  L.  Eastlake,  F.R.I.B.A. 
London,  Longman  and  Co.,  1872. — In  this  work  Mr.  Eastlake  had  estimated 
very  highly  Mr.  Ruskin's  influence  on  modern  architecture,  whilst  his 
reviewer  was  "disposed  to  say  that  Mr.  Ruskin's  direct  and  immediate 
influences  had  almost  alw^ays  been  in  the  wrong;  and  his  more  indirect 
influences  as  often  in  the  right."  It  is  upon  these  words  that  Mr.  Ruskin 
comments  here,  and  to  this  comment  the  critic  replied  in  a  letter  which 
appeared  in  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette  of  the  20th  inst.  The  main  portion  of 
his  reply  was  as  follow^s  :  "The  direct  influences,  then,  which  I  had  prin- 
cipally in  my  mind  were  those  wliich  had  resulted  in  a  preference  for 
Venetian  over  English  Gothic,  in  the  underrating  of  expressional  character 
in  architecture,  and  the  overrating  of  sculptured  ornament,  especially  of  a 
naturalistic  and  imitative  character,  and  more  generally  in  an  exclusiveness 
which  limited  the  due  influence  of  some,  as  I  think,  noble  styles  of  archi- 
tecture. By  the  indirect  influences  I  meant  the  habit  of  looking  at  ques- 
tions of  architectural  art  in  the  light  of  imaginative  ideas;  the  recognition 
of  the  vital  importance  of  such  questions  even  in  their  least  important 
details ;  and  generall}'  an  enthusiasm  and  activity  which  could  have 
resulted  from  no  less  a  force  than  Mr.  Ruskin's  wondrously  suggestive 
genius."  To  this  explanation  Mr.  Ruskin  replied  in  his  second  letter  on 
the  subject. 


156  LETTEKS  o:n"  ART.  [1872. 

saying  that  my  direct  influence  on  architecture  is  always 
wrong,  and  my  indirect  influence  right ;  because,  if  that  be  so, 
I  will  try  to  exercise  only  indirect  influence  on  my  Oxford 
pupils.  But  the  fact  to  my  own  notion  is  otherwise.  I  am 
proud  enough  to  hope,  for  instance,  that  I  have  had  some 
direct  influence  on  Mr.  Street ;  and  I  do  not  doubt  but  that 
the  public  will  have  more  satisfaction  from  his  Law  Courts  * 
than  they  have  had  from  anything  built  within  fifty  years. 
But  I  have  had  indirect  influence  on  nearly  every  cheap  villa- 
builder  between  this  f  and  Bromley  ;  and  there  is  scarcely  a 
public-house  near  the  Crystal  Palace  but  sells  its  gin  and  bit- 
ters under  pseudo-Yenetian  capitals  copied  from  the  Church 
of  the  Madonna  of  Health  or  of  Miracles.  And  one  of  my 
principal  notions  for  leaving  my  present  house  is  that  it  is 
surrounded  everywhere  by  the  accursed  Frankenstein  monsters 
of,  mdirectly,  my  own  making. 

I  am.  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

John  Kuskin. 
Mmch  15. 


[From  •'  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  March  21, 1872.] 

MB.   RUSKI^'S  INFLUENCE:   A  REJOINDER. 

To  fhe  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  am  obliged  by  your  critic's  reply  to  my  question, 
but  beg  to  observe  that,  meaning  what  he  explains  himself  to 
have  meant,  he  should  simply  have  said  that  my  influence  on 
temper  was  right,  and  on  taste  wrong;  the  influence  being  in 
both  cases  equally  "  direct."  On  questions  of  taste  I  Avill  not 
venture  into  discussion  with  him,  but  must  be  perinitted  to 

*  Mr.  Street's  design  for  the  New  Law  Courts  was,  after  much  discus- 
sion, selected,  May  30,  1868,  and  approved  by  commission,  August,  1870. 
The  building  was  not,  however,  begun  till  February,  1874,  and  the  hope 
expressed  in  this  letter  is  therefore,  unfortunately,  no  expression  of  opinion 
on  the  work  itself. 

t  Denmark  Hill. 


1877.]  MODERN    RKSTORATIOX.  157 

correct  liis  statement  that  I  have  persuaded  any  one  to  prefer 
Venetian  to  English  Gothic.  I  have  stated  that  Italian — 
chiefly  Pisan  and  Florentine — Gothic  is  the  noblest  school  of 
Gothic  hitherto  existent,  which  is  true ;  and  that  one  form  of 
Venetian  Gothic  deserves  singular  respect  for  the  manner  of 
its  development.  I  gave  the  mouldings  and  shaft  measure- 
ments of  that  form,*  and  to  so  little  purpose,  that  I  challenge 
your  critic  to  find  in  London,  or  within  twenty  miles  of  it,  a 
single  Venetian  casement  built  on  the  sections  which  I  gave  as 
normal.  For  Venetian  architecture  developed  out  of  British 
moral  consciousness  I  decline  to  be  answerable.  His  accusation 
that  I  induced  architects  to  study  sculpture  more,  and  what  he 
is  pleased  to  call  "  expressional  character''  less,  I  admit.  I 
should  be  glad  if  he  would  tell  me  what,  Ijefore  my  baneful 
influence  began  to  be  felt,  the  expressional  character  of  our 
building  was;  and  I  will  reconsider  my  principles  if  he  can 
point  out  to  me,  on  any  modern  building  either  in  London  or, 
as  aforesaid,  within  twenty  miles  round,  a  single  piece  of  good 
sculpture  of  which  the  architect  repents,  or  the  public  com- 
plains. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  EusKm. 
March  21. 


LFrom  "The  Liverpool  Daily  Post,"  June  9,  1877.] 

MODERN  RESTORATION^ 

Venice,  loth  April,  1877. 
My  dear  Sir  :  It  is  impossible  for  any  one  to  know  the 
horror  and  contempt  with  which  I  regard  modern  restoration 

*  See  "Arabian  Windows  in  the  Campo  Santa  Maria,  Mater  Domini." 
Plate  ii.  of  the  "Examples  of  the  Architecture  of  Venice,"  selected  and 
drawn  to  measurement  from  the  edifice,  1851.  And  see,  too,  "Stones  of 
Venice,"  vol.  ii.,  chap,  vii.,  Gothic  Palaces. 

f  This  letter  was  originally  received  by  "a  Liverpool  gentleman."  and 
sent  inclosed  in  a  long  letter  signed  "An  Antiquarian,"  to  the  Livcrpixd 
Daily  Post. 


158  LETTERS    ON   ART.  [1877. 

— but  it  is  so  great  tliat  it  simply  paralyzes  me  in  despair, — 
and  in  the  sense  of  sucli  difference  in  all  thought  and  feeling 
between  me  and  the  people  I  live  in  the  midst  of,  almost  makes 
it  useless  for  me  to  talk  to  them.  Of  course  all  restoration  is 
accursed  architect's  jobbery,  and  will  go  on  as  long  as  they  can 
get  their  filthy  bread  by  such  business.  But  things  are  worse 
here  than  in  England  :  you  have  little  there  left  to  lose — here, 
every  hour  is  ruining  buildings  of  inestimable  beauty  and  his- 
torical value — simply  to  keep  stone-lawyers  "  at  work.  I  am 
obliged  to  hide  my  face  from  it  all,  and  work  at  other  things, 
or  I  should  die  of  mere  indignation  and  disgust. 

Ever  truly  yours, 

J.  KUSKIN. 


[From  "The  Kidderminster  Times,"  July  28, 1877.] 

RIBBESFOBD    CHURCH. 

Brantwood,  Coniston,  Lancashire, 
July  24,  1877. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Kidderminster  Times." 

Sir  :  It  chanced  that,  on  the  morning  of  the  Sunday,  when 
the  appearances  of  danger  in  the  walls  of  Ribbesford  Church 
])egan  seriously  to  manifest  themselves  (according  to  the  report 
in  your  columns  of  the  21st  inst.),t  I  was  standing  outside  of 
the  church,  listening  to  the  singing  of  the  last  hymn  as  the 
sound  came  through  the  open  door  (with  the  Archer  Knight 
sculptured  above  it),  and  showing  to  the  friend  who  had  brought 
me  to  the  lovely  place  the  extreme  interest  of  the  old  perpen- 
dicular traceries  in  the  freehand  working  of  the  apertures. 

*  An  obvious  misprint  for  "stone-layers." 

f  Ribbesford  Church  was  finally  closed  after  the  morning  service  on 
Sunday,  July  15,  1877,  It  was  then  restored,  and  was  reopened  and 
reconsecrated  on  June  15,  1879.  The  Kidderminster  Times  of  the  21st  inst. 
contained  an  account  of  a  meeting  of  the  Ribbesford  parishioners  to  con- 
sider the  restoration  of  the  church.  Hence  the  allusions  in  this  letter  to 
"copying"  the  traceries. 


1879.]  ST.    mark's,    VENICE.  159 

Peniiit  me  to  say,  with  reference  to  the  proposed  restoration 
of  the  church,  that  no  modern  architect,  no  mason  either,  can, 
or  woukl  if  they  coiikl,  "  copy"  those  traceries.  They  will 
assuredly  put  up  wnth  geometrical  models  in  their  place,  which 
will  be  no  more  like  the  old  traceries  than  a  Kensington  paper 
pattern  is  like  a  living  flower.  Whatever  else  is  added  or 
removed,  those  traceries  should  be  rei)laccd  as  they  are,  and 
left  in  reverence  until  they  moulder  away.  If  they  are  already 
too  nnich  decayed  to  hold  the  glass  safely  (which  I  do  not 
believe),  any  framework  which  may  be  necessary  can  be 
arranged  to  hold  the  casements  within  them,  leaving  their  bars 
entirely  disengaged,  and  merely  kej^t  from  falling  by  iron 
supports.  But  if  these  are  to  be  "  copied,"  why  in  the  world 
cannot  the  congregation  pay  for  a  new  and  original  church,  to 
display  the  genius  and  wealth  of  the  nineteenth  century 
somewhere  else,  and  leave  the  dear  old  ruin  to  grow  gray  by 
Severn  side  in  peace  ''( 

I  am,  Sir,  yoiu'  faithful  servant, 

J.    KUSKIN. 


CIRCULARS  RESPECTING  MEMORIAL  STUDIES  OF  ST.  MARK'S, 
VENICE,  NOW  IN  PROGRESS  UNDER  MR.  RUSKINS  DI- 
RECTION. 

This  circular  will  he  given  to  visitors  to  the  Old  Water-color  Society's  Exhibi- 
tion, Pall  Mall  East,  or  on  application  to  tlie  Fine  Art  Society,  148  New  Bond 
Street. 

My  friends  have  expressed  much  surprise  at  my  absence 
from  the  public  meetings  called  in  defence  of  St.  Mark's.  They 
cannot,  however,  be  too  clearly  certified  that  I  am  now  entirely 
unable  to  take  part  in  exciting  business,  or  even,  without  grave 

*  This  circular,  whicli  was  distributed  as  above  noted  during  the  winter 
of  1879-80,  is  here  reprinted  by  Mr.  Kuskin's  permission,  in  connection 
with  the  preceding  letters  upon  restoration  in  architecture.  See  the  Notes 
on  Prout  and  Hunt,  1879-80,  p.  71. 


160  LETTERS  ON   ART.  [1879. 

danger,  to  allow  my  mind  to  dwell  on  the  subjects  which, 
having  once  been  dearest  to  it,  are  now  the  sources  of  acutest 
pain.  The  illness  which  all  but  killed  me  two  years  ago  *  was 
not  brought  on  by  overwork,  but  by  grief  at  the  course  of 
public  affairs  in  England,  and  of  affairs,  public  and  private 
alike,  in  Venice;  the  distress  of  many  an  old  and  deeply 
regarded  friend  there  among  the  humbler  classes  of  the  city 
being  as  necessary  a  consequence  of  the  modern  system  of 
centralization,  as  the  destruction  of  her  ancient  civil  and 
religious  buildings. 

How  far  forces  of  this  national  momentum  may  be  arrested 
by  protest,  or  mollified  by  petition,  I  know  not ;  what  in  either 
kind  I  have  felt  myself  able  to  do  has  been  done  two  years 
since,  in  conjunction  with  one  of  the  few  remaining  repre- 
sentatives of  the  old  Venetian  noblesse.f  All  that  now  remains 
for  me  is  to  use  what  time  may  be  yet  granted  for  such  record 
as  hand  and  heart  can  make  of  the  most  precious  buikling  in 
Europe,  standing  yet  in  the  eyes  of  men  and  the  sunshine  of 
heaven. 

The  drawing  of  the  first  two  arches  of  the  west  front,  now 
under  threat  of  restoration,  which,  as  an  honorary  member  of 
the  Old  Water-color  Society,  I  have  the  privilege  of  exhibiting 
in  its  rooms  this  year,  shows  with  sufficient  accuracy  the  actual 
state  of  the  building,  and  the  peculiar  qualities  of  its  architec- 
ture. J  The  j)rinciples  of  that  architecture  are  analyzed  at 
length  in  the  second  volume  of  the  "  Stones  of  Venice,"  and 
the  whole  facade  described  there  with  the  best  care  I  could,  in 
hope  of  directing  the  attention  of  English  architects  to  the 
forms  of  Greek  sculpture  which  enrich  it.§  The  words  have 
been  occasionally  read  for  the  sound  of  them ;  and  perhaps, 

*In  February,  1878;  seethe  "  Turner  Notes"  of  that  year,  and  "Fors 
Clavigera,"  New  Series — Letter  the  Fourth,  March,  1880. 

f  Count  Alvise  Piero  Zorzi,  the  author  of  an  admirable  and  authoritative 
essay  on  the  restoration  of  St.  Mark's  (Venice,  1877). 

:j:Tliis  drawing  (No.  28  in  the  Exhibition)  was  of  a  small  portion  of  the 
w^est  front. 

§  "  Stones  of  Venice,"  vol.  ii.,  chapter  4,  of  original  edition,  and  vol.  i., 
chapter  4,  of  the  smaller  edition  for  the  use  of  travellers. 


1879.]  ST.    mark's,    VENICE.  l6l 

when  the  building  is  destroyed,  may  be  some  day,  with  amaze- 
ment, perceived  to  have  been  true. 

In  the  mean  time,  the  drawing  just  referred  to,  every  toncli 
of  it  made  from  the  building,  and  left  as  the  color  dried  in  the 
spring  mornings  of  1877,  will  make  clear  some  of  the  points 
chiefly  insisted  on  in  the  ''  Stones  of  Venice,"  and  which  are 
of  yet  more  importance  now."^  Of  these,  the  first  and  main 
ones  are  the  exquisite  delicacy  of  the  work  and  perfection  of 
its  preservation  to  this  time.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  English 
visitor  never  realizes  thoroughly  what  it  is  that  he  looks  at 
in  the  St.  Mark's  porches :  its  glittering  confusion  in  a  style 
unexampled,  its  bright  colors,  its  mingled  marbles,  produce  on 
him  no  real  impression  of  age,  and  its  diminutive  size  scarcely 
anv  of  grandeur.  It  looks  to  him  almost  like  a  stao^e  scene, 
got  lip  solidly  for  some  sudden  festa.  Xo  mere  guide-book's 
passing  assertion  of  date — this  century  or  the  other — can  in 
the  least  make  him  even  conceive,  and  far  less  feel,  that  he  is 
actually  standing  before  the  very  shafts  and  stones  that  were 
set  on  their  foundations  here  while  Harold  the  Saxon  stood  by 
the  grave  of  the  Confessor  under  the  fresh-raised  vaults  of  the 
first  Norman  Westminster  Abbey,  of  which  now  a  single  arch 
only  remains  standing.  He  cannot,  by  any  effort,  hnagine  that 
those  exquisite  and  lace-like  sculptures  of  twined  acanthus — 
every  leaf -edge  as  sharp  and  fine  as  if  they  were  green  weeds 
fresh  springing  in  the  dew,  by  the  Pan-droseion  f — were, 
indeed,  cut  and  finished  to  their  perfect  grace  while  the  IS^orman 
axes  were  hewing  out  rough  zigzags  and  dentils  round  the 
aisles  of  Durham  and  Lindisfarne.  Or  nearer,  in  what  is  left 
of  our  own  Canterbury — it  is  but  an  hour's  journey  in  pleasant 
Kent — you  may  compare,  almost  as  if  you  looked  from  one  to 
the  other,  the  grim  grotesque  of  the  block  capitals  in  the  crypt 
with  the  foliage  of  these  flexile  ones,  and  with  their  marble 

*  In  the  first  edition  of  this  circular  this  sentence  ran  as  follows:  "  In 
the  mean  time,  with  the  aid  of  the  drawing  just  referred  to,  every  touch  of 
it  from  the  building,  and  left,  as  the  color  dried  in  the  morning  light  of  the 
lOlh  May,  1877,  some  of  the  points  chiefly  insisted  on  in  the  '  Stones  of 
Venice,'  are  of  importance  now." 

t  Printed  "  Pan-chorcion"  in  the  first  edition. 


162  LETTEUS   OK   ART.  [1879. 

cloves — scarcely  distinguishable  from  the  living  birds  that 
nestle  between  them.  Or,  going  down  two  centuries  (for  the 
:ffllings  of  the  portico  arches  wei-e  not  completed  till  after 
1204),  what  thirteenth-century  work  among  our  gray  limestone 
walls  can  be  thought  of  as  wrought  in  the  same  hour  with  that 
wreath  of  intertwined  white  marble,  relieved  by  gold,  of  which 
the  tenderest  and  sharpest  lines  of  the  pencil  cannot  finely 
enough  express  the  surfaces  and  undulations?  For  indeed, 
without  and  within,  St.  Mark's  is  not,  in  the  real  nature  of  it, 
a  piece  of  architecture,  but  a  jewelled  casket  and  painted 
reliquary,  chief  of  the  treasures  in  w^hat  were  once  the  world's 
treasuries  of  sacred  things,  the  kingdoms  of  Christendom. 

A  jewelled  casket,  every  jewel  of  which  was  itself  sacred. 
Not  a  slab  of  it,  nor  a  shaft,  but  has  been  brought  from  the 
churches  descendants  of  the  great  Seven  of  Asia,  or  from  the 
Christian-Greek  of  Corinth,  Crete,  and  Thrace,  or  the  Chris- 
tian-Israelite in  Palestine — the  central  archivolt  copied  from 
that  of  the  church  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  and  the  opposing 
lions  or  phoenixes  of  its  sculptures  from  the  treasury  of  Atreus 
and  the  citadel  of  Tyre. 

Thus,  beyond  all  measure  of  value  as  a  treasury  of  art,  it  is 
also,  beyond  all  other  volumes,  venerable  as  a  codex  of  religion. 
Just  as  the  white  foliage  and  birds  on  their  golden  ground  are 
descendants,  in  direct  line,  from  the  ivory  and  gold  of  Phidias, 
so  the  Greek  pictures  and  inscriptions,  whether  in  mosaic  or 
sculpture,  throughout  the  building,  record  the  unbroken  unity 
of  spiritual  influence  from  the  Father  of  light — or  the  races 
w^hose  own  poets  had  said  ''  We  also  are  his  offspring" — down 
to  the  day  when  all  their  gods,  not  slain,  but  changed  into  new 
creatures,  became  the  types  to  them  of  the  mightier  Chris- 
tian spirits;  and  Perseus  became  St.  George,  and  Mars  St. 
Michael,  and  Athena  the  Madonna,  and  Zeus  their  revealed 
Father  in  Heaven. 

In  all  the  history  of  human  mind,  there  is  nothing  so  won- 
derful, nothing  so  eventful,  as  this  spiritual  change.  So  inex- 
tricably is  it  interwoven  with  the  most  divine,  the  most  distant 
threads  of  human  thought  and  effort,  that  while  none  of  the 


379.]  ST.    MARK'S,    VENICE.  163 

lioughts  of  St.  Paul  or  the  visions  of  St.  John  can  be  iinder- 
tood  without  our  understanding  lirst  the  imagery  familiar  to 
he  Pagan  worship  of  the  Greeks;  on  the  other  hand,  no 
iiiderstanding  of  the  real  purport  of  Greek  religion  can  be 
ecurely  reached  without  watching  the  translation  of  its  myths 
nto  the  messai::e  of  Christianitv. 

Both  by  the  natural  temper  of  my  mind,  and  by  the  la])or 
)f  forty  years  given  to  this  subject  in  its  practical  issues  on 
he  present  state  "^^  of  Christendom,  I  have  become,  in  some 
neasure,  able  both  to  show  and  to  interpret  these  most  precious 
sculptures ;  and  my  healtli  has  been  so  far  given  back  to  me 
that  if  I  am  at  this  moment  aided,  it  will,  so  far  as  I  can  judge, 
be  easily  possil:»le  for  me  to  complete  the  work  so  long  in 
Dreparation.  There  will  yet,  I  doubt  not,  be  tune  to  obtain 
'perfect  record  of  all  that  is  to  be  destroyed.  I  have  entirely 
honest  and  able  draughtsmen  at  my  command  ;  my  o^vn  resig- 
nation f  of  my  Oxford  Professorship  has  given  me  leisure ; 
and  all  that  I  want  from  the  antiquarian  sympathy  of  England 
is  so  much  instant  help  as  may  permit  me,  while  yet  in  avail- 
able vigor  of  body  and  mind,  to  get  the  records  made  under 
my  own  overseership,  and  registered  for  sufficient  and  true. 
The  casts  and  drawings  which  I  mean  to  have  made  will  be 
preserved  in  a  consistent  series  in  my  Museum  at  Sheffield, 
where  I  have  freehold  ground  enough  to  build  a  perfectly 
lighted  gallery  for  their  reception.  I  have  used  the  words  "  I 
want,"  as  if  praying  this  thing  for  myself.  It  is  not  so.  If 
only  some  other  person  could  and  would  undertake  all  this, 
Heaven  knows  how  gladly  I  would  leave  the  task  to  him.  But 
there  is  no  one  else  at  present  able  to  do  it :  if  not  now  by  me, 
it  can  never  be  done  more.  And  so  I  leave  it  to  the  readei-'s 
grace.  J.  Ruskin. 

All  subscriptions  to  be  sent  to  Mr.  G.  Allen,  Sunnyside, 
Orpington,  Kent. 

*  For  "  state,"  the  first  edition  reads  "  mind,"  and  for  "  have  become,  in 
some  measure,  able,"  it  lias  "  have  qualified  myself."  So  again  for  "  am  at 
this  moment  aided,"  it  reads  "am  asked,  and  enabled  to  do  so." 

t  Early  in  1879. 


164  LETTEKS   ON   AKT.  [1879 


( 


POSTSCEIPT.* 


By  the  kindness  of  the  Society  of  Painters  in  Water-colors  I  ^ 

am  permitted  this  year,  in  view  of  the  crisis  of  the  fate  of  the 
fa9ade  of  St.  Mark's,  to  place  in  the  Exhibition-room  of  the 
Society  ten  photographs,  illustrative  of  its  past  and  present  state. 
I  have  already  made  use  of  them,  both  in  my  lectures  at  Oxford 
and  in  the  parts  of  Fors  Clavigera  intended  for  Art-teaching  at 
my  Sheffield  Museum ;  and  all  but  the  eighth  are  obtainable 
from  my  assistant,  Mr.  Ward  (2  Church  Terrace,  Eichmond), 
who  is  my  general  agent  for  photographs,  either  taken  under  my 
direction  (as  here,  Nos.  4,  9,  and  10),  or  specially  chosen  by  me 
for  purposes  of  Art  Education.  The  series  of  views  here  shown 
are  all  perfectly  taken,  with  great  clearness,  from  the  most 
important  points,  and  give,  consecutively,  complete  evidence 
respecting  the  fa9ade. 

They  are  arranged  in  the  following  order  : 

1.  The  Central  Porch.  ) 

2.  The  Two  Northern  Porches.  [  ^'''"''/XV*''  '''' 

3.  The  Two  Southern  Porches.  ) 

4.  The  Northern  Portico. 

5.  The  Southern  Portico.     Before  restoration. 

6.  The  West  Front,  in  Perspective.      Seen  from  the 

North. 

7.  The  West  Front,  in  Perspective.     Seen  from  the 

South. 

8.  The  South  Side.     Before  restoration. 

9.  Detail  of  Central  Archiyolt. 
10.  The  Cross  of  the  Merchants  of  Venice. 

This  last  photograph  is  not  of  St.  Mark's,  but  is  of  the  inscrip- 
tion which  I  discovered,  in  1877,  on  the  Church  of  St.  James  of 
the  Rialto.  It  is  of  the  9th  or  10th  century  (according  to  the 
best  antiquarians  of  Venice),  and  is  given  in  this  series,  first,  to 
confirm  the  closing  paragraph  in  my  notes  on  the  Prout  draw- 

*  Printed  in  the  second  edition  only. 


^m 


879.]  ST.    mark's,    VENICE.  1G5 

ngs  in  Bond  Street  ;*  and  secondly,  to  show  the  jierfect  preser- 
vation even  of  the  hair-strokes  in  letters  carved  in  the  Istrian 
narble  used  at  Venice  a  thousand  years  ago.  The  inscription 
)n  the  cross  is — 

"  Sit  crux  vera  salus  liuic  twu  Christc  loco." 
(Be  Thy  Cross,  O  Christ,  the  true  safety  of  this  place.) 

* 
A.nd  on  the  band  beneath — 

"  Hoc  circa  tcmplum  sit  jus  mcrcantibus  a?quum, 
Pondera  nee  vergant  nee  sit  conventio  prava." 
(Around  this  temple  let  the  merchants'  law  be  just. 
Their  weights  true,  and  their  contracts  fair.) 


The  bearing  of  this  inscription  on  the  relations  of  Antonio  to 
Shylock  may  perhaps  not  be  perceived  by  a  public  which  now — 
)![|Consistently  and  naturally  enough,  but  ominously  —  considers 
(JShylock  a  victim  to  the  support  of  the  principles  of  legitimate 
trade,  and  Antonio  a  ^* speculator  and  sentimentalist."  From 
the  series  of  photographs  of  St.  Mark's  itself,  I  cannot  but  think 
even  the  least  attentive  observer  must  receive  one  strong  impres- 
sion— that  of  the  singular  preservation  of  the  minutest  details  in 
its  sculpture.  Observe,  this  is  a  quite  separate  question  from  the 
st (thill ty  of  the  fabric.  In  our  northern  cathedrals  the  stone, 
for  the  most  part,  moulders  away;  and  the  restorer  usually 
replaces  it  by  fresh  sculpture,  on  the  faces  of  walls  of  which  the 
mass  is  perfectly  secure.  Here,  at  St.  Mark's,  on  the  contrary, 
the  only  possible  pretence  for  restoration  has  been,  and  is,  the 

*  The  reference  is  to  the  closing  paragraph  of  the  Preface  to  the  Notes, 
which  runs  as  follows:  "  Athena,  observe,  of  the  Agora,  or  Market  Place. 
And  St.  James  of  the  Deep  Stream  or  ^Market  Rii-er.  The  Angels  of  Hon- 
est Sale  and  Honest  Porterage;  such  honest  porterage  being  the  grandeur  of 
the  Grand  Canal,  and  of  all  other  canals,  rivers,  sounds,  and  seas  that  ever 
moved  in  wavering  morris  under  the  night.  And  the  eternally  electric 
light  of  the  embankment  of  that  Rialto  stream  was  shed  upon  it  by  the 
Cross— know  you  that  for  certain,  you  dwellers  by  high  embanked  and 
steamer-bi^rdened  Thames.  And  learn  from  your  poor  wandering  painter 
this  lesson — for  the  sum  of  the  best  he  had  to  give  you  (it  is  the  Alpha  of 
the  Laws  of  true  human  life) — that  no  city  is  prosperous  in  the  sight  of 
Heaven,  unless  the  peasant  sells  in  its  market— adding  tliis  lesson  of  Gentile 
Bellini's  for  the  Omega,  that  no  city  is  ever  righteous  in  the  Sight  of  Heaven 
unless  the  Noble  walks  in  its  street."— Notes  on  Prout  and  Hunt,  p.  44. 


166  LETTERS    OX    ART.  [187^ 

alleged  insecurity  of  the  masses  of  inner  wall — the  external  sculpJ 
tures  remaining  in  faultless  perfection,  so  far  as  unaffected  by' 
direct  human  violence.  Both  the  Greek  and  Istrian  marbles  used 
at  Venice  are  absolutely  defiant  of  hypaethral  influences,  and  the ' 
edges  of  their  delicatest  sculpture  remain  to  this  day  more  sharp 
than  if  they  had  been  cut  in  steel — for  then  they  would  have 
rusted  away.  It  is  especially,  for  example,  of  this  quality  that  I 
have  painted  the  ornament  of  the  St.  Jean  d'Acre  pillars,  Ko. 
107,  which  the  reader  may  at  once  compare  with  the  daguerreo- 
type (No.  108)  beside  it,  which  are  exhibited,  with  the  Prout  and 
Hunt  drawings,  at  the  Fine  Art  Society's  rooms.*  These  pillars 
are  known  to  be  not  later  than  the  sixth  century,  yet  wherever 
external  violence  has  spared  their  decoration  it  is  sharp  as  a  fresh- 
growing  thistle.  Thoughout  the  whole  faQade  of  St.  Mark's,  the 
capitals  have  only  here  and  there  by  casualty  lost  so  much  as  a 
volute  or  an  acanthus  leaf,  and  whatever  remains  is  perfect  as  on 
the  day  it  was  set  in  its  place,  mellowed  and  subdued  only  in 
color  by  time,  but  white  still,  clearly  white;  and  gray,  still  softly 
gray;  its  porphyry  purple  as  an  Orleans  plum,  and  the  serpen- 
tine as  green  as  a  greengage.  Note  also,  that  in  this  through- 
out perfect  decorated  surface  there  is  not  a  loose  joint.  The 
appearances  of  dislocation,  which  here  and  there  look  like  yield- 
ing of  masonry,  are  merely  carelessness  in  the  rej)lacing  or  reset- 
ting of  the  marble  armor  at  the  different  times  when  the  front 
has  been  retouched — in  several  cases  quite  wilful  freaks  of  arrange- 
ment. The  slope  of  the  porphyry  shaft,  for  instance,"  on  the 
angle  at  the  left  of  my  drawing,  looks  like  dilapidation.  Were 
it  really  so,  the  building  would  be  a  heap  of  ruins  in  twenty-four 
hours.  These  porches  sustain  no  weight  above — their  pillars 
carry  merely  an  open  gallery;  and  the  inclination  of  the  red 
marble  pilasters  at  the  angle  is  not  yielding  at  all,  but  an  origi- 
nally capricious  adjustment  of  the  marble  armor.  It  will  be 
seen  that  the  investing  marbles  between  the  arch  and  pilaster  are 
cut  to  the  intended  inclination,  which  brings  the  latter  nearly 
into  contact  with  the  upper  archivolt;  the  appearance  of  actual 
contact  being  caused  by  the  projection  of  the  dripstone.  There 
are,  indeed,  one  or  two  leaning  towers  in  Venice  whose  founda- 

*  See  the  "  Notes  on  Prout  and  Hunt,"  p.  78. 


1879.]  ST.    mark's,    VENICE.  167 

tions  have  partly  yielded;  but  if  anything  were  in  danger  on  St. 
Mark's  Place,  it  would  be  the  campanile — three  hundred  feet 
high — and  not  the  little  shafts  and  galleries  within  reach — too 
easy  reach — of  the  gaslighter's  ladder.  And  the  only  dilapida- 
tions I  have  myself  seen  on  this  porch,  since  I  first  drew  it  forty- 
six  years  ago,  have  been,  first,  those  caused  by  the  insertion  of 
the  lamps  themselves,  and  then  the  breaking  away  of  the  marble 
network  of  the  main  capital  by  the  habitual  clattering  of  the 
said  gaslighter's  ladder  against  it.  A  piece  of  it  which  I  saw  so 
broken  off,  and  made  an  oration  over  to  the  passers-by  in  no  less 
broken  Italian,  is  in  my  mineral  cabinet  at  Brantwood. 

Before  leaving  this  subject  of  the  inclined  angle,  let  me  note 
— usefully,  though  not  to  my  present  purpose — that  the  entire 
beauty  of  St.  Mark's  campanile  depends  on  this  structure,  there 
definitely  seen  to  be  one  of  real  safety.  This  grace  and  apparent 
strength  of  the  whole  mass  would  be  destroyed  if  the  sides  of  it 
were  made  vertical.  In  Gothic  towers,  the  same  effect  is  obtained 
by  the  retiring  of  the  angle  buttresses,  without  actual  inclination 
of  any  but  the  coping  lines. 

In  the  Photograph  Xo.  5  the  slope  of  the  angles  in  the  corre- 
spondent portico,  as  it  stood  before  restoration,  is  easily  visible 
and  measurable,  the  difference  being,  even  on  so  small  a  scale, 
full  the  twentieth  of  an  inch  between  the  breadth  at  base  and 
top,  at  the  angles,  while  the  lines  bearing  the  inner  arch  are  per- 
fectly vertical. 

There  was,  indeed,  as  will  be  seen  at  a  glance,  some  displace- 
ment of  the  pillars  dividing  the  great  window  above,  immediately 
to  the  right  of  the  portico.  But  these  pillars  were  exactly  the 
part  of  the  south  front  which  carried  no  weight.  The  arch  above 
them  is  burdened  only  by  its  own  fringes  of  sculpture;  and  the 
pillars  carried  only  the  bit  of  decorated  panelling,  which  is  now 
bent — not  outwards,  as  it  would  have  been  by  pressure,  but 
inwards.  The  arch  has  not  subsided;  it  was  always  of  the  same 
height  as  the  one  to  the  right  of  it  (the  Byzantine  builders  throw- 
ing their  arches  always  in  whatever  lines  they  chose);  nor  is  there 
a  single  crack  or  displacement  in  the  sculpture  of  the  investing 
fringe. 

In  No.  3  (to  the  right  hand  in  the  frame)  there  is  dilapida- 
tion and  danger  enough  certainly;  but  that  is  wholly  caused  by 


168  .  LETTERS   OX   ART.  [1879. 

the  savage  and  brutal  carelessness  with  which  the  restored  parts 
are  joined  to  the  old.  The  photograph  bears  deadly  and  per- 
petual witness  against  the  system  of  "  making  work,"  too  well 
known  now  among  English  as  well  as  Italian  operatives;  but  it 
bears  witness,  as  deadly,  against  the  alleged  accuracy  of  the  res- 
toration itself.  The  ancient  dentils  are  bold,  broad,  and  cut 
with  the  free  hand,  as  all  good  Greek  work  is;  the  new  ones, 
little  more  than  half  their  size,  are  cut  with  the  servile  and  hor- 
rible rigidity  of  the  modern  mechanic. 

This  quality  is  what  M.  Meduna,  in  the  passage  quoted  from 
his  defence  of  himself^  in  the  Standard,  has  at  once  the  dul- 
ness  and  the  audacity  actually  to  boast  of  as  '^  plus  exacte"! 

Imagine  a  Kensington  student  set  to  copy  a  picture  by  Velas- 
quez, and  substituting  a  Nottingham  lace  pattern,  traced  with 
absolute  exactness,  for  the  painter's  sjoarkle  and  flow  and  flame, 
and  boasting  of  his  improvements  as  "plus  exacte'\f  That  im- 
precisely what  the  Italian  restorer  does  for  his  original;  but, 
ajas!  he  has  the  inestimable  privilege  also  of  destroying  the 
original  as  he  works,  and  putting  his  student's  caricature  in  its 
place  I  Nor  are  any  words  bitter  or  contemptuous  enough  to 
describe  the  bestial  stupidities  w^hich  have  thus  already  rei)]accd 
the  floor  of  the  church,  in  my  early  days  the  loveliest  in  Italy, 
and  the  most  sacred. 

In  the  Photograph  No.  7  there  is,  and  there  only,  one  piece 
of  real  dilapidation — the  nodding  pinnacle  propped  on  the  right. 
Those  pinnacles  stand  over  the  roof  gutters,  and  their  bracket 
supports  are,  of  course,  liable  to  displacement,  if  th^  p-utters  get 
choked  by  frost  or  otherwise  neglected.  The  pinnacle  is  not  ten 
feet  high,  and  can  be  replaced  and  secured  as  easily  as  the  cowl 
on  a  chimney-pot.  The  timbers  underneath  were  left  there 
merely  to  give  the  wished-for  appearance  of  repairs  going  on. 
They  defaced  the  church  front  through  the  whole  winter  of  187G. 
I  copied  the  bills  stuck  on  them  one  Sunday,  and  they  are  printed 
in  the  78th  number  of  Fors  Clavigera,  the  first  being  the  an- 
nouncement of  the  Reunited  agencies  for  information  on  all 
matters  of  commercial  enterprise  and  speculation,  and  the  last 
the  announcement  of  the  loss  of  a  cinnamon-colored  little  bitch, 

*  See  the  Standard  (Dec.  3.  1879).  :M.  Meduna  was  the  architect  who 
carried  out  the  "  restoration"  of  the  south  fa9acle  of  the  Cathedral. 


1879.]  •  ST.     MARK  S,     VENICE.  1G9 

with  rather  long  ears  (colV  orecchie  piiitosto  Juiujhe).  I  waited 
through  the  winter  to  see  how  much  the  Venetians  really  cared 
for  the  look  of  their  church;  but  lodged  a  formal  remonstrance 
in  March  with  one  of  the  more  reasonable  civic  authorities,  who 
presently  had  them  removed.  The  remonstrance  ought,  of 
course,  to  have  come  from  the  clergy;  but  they  contented  them- 
selves with  cutting  flower-wreaths  on  paper  to  hang  over  the 
central  door  at  Christmas-time.  For  the  rest,  the  i)retence  of 
rottenness  in  tlie  walls  is  really  too  gross  to  be  answered.  'J'here 
are  brick  buildings  in  Italy  by  tens  of  thousands,  Roman,  Lom- 
bardic,  Gothic,  on  all  scales  and  in  all  exposures.  Which  of 
them  has  rotted  or  fallen,  but  by  violence?  Shall  the  tower  of 
Garisenda  stand,  and  the  Campanile  of  Verona,  and  the  tower  of 
St.  Mark's,  and,  forsooth,  this  little  fifty  feet  of  unweighted  wall 
be  rotten  and  dangerous? 

Much  more  I  could  say,  and  show;  but  the  certainty  of  the 
ruin  of  poor  Bedlamite  Venice  is  in  her  own  evil  will,  and  not 
to  be  averted  by  any  human  help  or  pleading.  Her  Sahba  delle 
streghe  has  truly  come;  and  in  her  own  words  (see  Fors,  letter 
77th):  **Finalmente  la  Piazza  di  S.  Marco  sara  invasa  e  com- 
pletamente  illuminata  dalle  Fiamme  di  Belzebu.  Perche  il  Sahba 
possa  riuscire  piu  complete,  si  raccomanda  a  tutti  gli  spettatori 
di  fischiare  durante  le  fiamme  come  anime  dannate." 

Meantime,  in  what  Saturday  pause  may  be  before  this  Witches' 
Sabbath,  if  I  have,  indeed,  any  English  friends,  let  them  now 
help  me,  and  my  fellow-workers,  to  get  such  casts,  and  colorings, 
and  measurings,  as  may  be  of  use  in  time  to  come.  I  am  not 
used  to  the  begging  tone,  and  will  not  say  more  than  that  what 
is  given  me  will  go  in  mere  daily  bread  to  the  workers,  and  that 
next  year,  if  I  live,  there  shall  be  some  exposition  of  what  we 
have  got  done,  with  the  best  account  I  can  render  of  its  parts 
and  pieces.  Fragmentary  enough  they  must  be, — poor  fallen 
plumes  of  the  winged  lion's  wings, — yet  I  think  I  can  plume  a 
true  shaft  or  two  with  them  yet. 

Some  copies  of  the  second  edition  of  this  circular  had  printed  at  the  top 
of  its  last  and  otherwise  blank  page  the  words,  "  Present  Stute  of  SubsnHp- 
tion  Listis: — ,"  a  printer's  error,  mistaken  by  some  readers  for  a  piece  of 
dry  humor. 

Subscriptions  were  collected  by  ^Mr.  G.  Allen,  as  above  intimated,  and 


170  LETTERS   ON   ART.  [1879. 

also  by  Mr.  F.  W.  Pullen,  secretary  to  the  Ruskin  Society  of  Manchester, 
under  the  authority  of  the  following  letter,  which  was  printed  and  dis- 
tributed by  him:  ''November  29,  1879. — Dear  Mr.  Pullen:  I  am  very  glad 
to  have  your  most  satisfactory  letter,  and  as  gladly  give  you  authority  to 
receive  subscriptions  for  drawings  and  sculptures  of  St.  Mark's.  Mr.  Bun- 
ney's  large  painting  of  the  whole  west  facade,  ordered  by  me  a  year  and  a 
half  ago,  and  in  steady  progress  ever  since,  is  to  be  completed  this  spring. 
It  was  a  £500  commission  for  the  Guild,  but  I  don't  w^ant  to  have  to  pay  it 
with  Guild  capital.  I  have  the  power  of  getting  casts,  also,  in  places  where 
nobody  else  can,  and  have  now  energy  enough  to  give  directions,  but  can 
no  more  pay  for  them  out  of  my  own  pocket.  Ever  gratefully  yours,  J.  R. 
As  a  formal  authority,  this  had  better  have  my  full  signature — John  Rus- 
kin." In  a  further  letter  to  Manchester  on  the  subject,  Mr.  Ruskin  wrote 
as  follows:  "It  is  wholly  impossible  for  me  at  present  to  take  any  part  in 
the  defence — at  last,  though  far  too  late — undertaken  by  the  true  artists 
and  scholars  of  England — of  the  most  precious  Christian  building  in  Europe;' 
.  .  .  nor  is  there  any  occasion  that  I  should,  if  only  those  who  care  for  me 
will  refer  to  what  I  have  already  written,  and  will  accept  from  me  the  full 
ratification  of  all  that  was  said  by  the  various  speakers,  all  without  excep- 
tion men  of  the  most  accurate  judgment  and  true  feeling,  at  the  meetmg 
held  in  Oxford.  All  that  I  think  it  necessary  for  you  to  lay,  directly  from 
myself,  before  the  meeting  you  are  about  to  hold,  is  the  explicit  statement 
of  two  facts  of  which  I  am  more  distinctly  cognizant  from  my  long  rcsi 
dences  in  Italy  at  different  periods,  and  in  Venice  during  these  last  years, 
than  any  other  person  can  be — namely,  the  Infidel — (malignantly  and  scorn- 
fully Infidel  and  anti-religionist)  aim  of  Italian  '  restoration  '—and  the 
totality  of  the  destruction  it  involves,  of  wiiatever  it  touches."  So  again, 
in  a  second  and  despairing  letter,  he  WTote:  "  You  cannot  be  too  strongl}'- 
assured  of  the  total  destruction  involved,  in  the  restoration  of  St.  Mark's. 
.  .  .  Then  the  plague  of  it  all  is.  What  can  you  do?  Nothing  would  be 
effectual,  but  the  appointment  of  a  Procurator  of  St.  Mark's,  with  an  cnoi'- 
mous  salary,  dependent  on  the  Church's  being  let  alone.  What  you  can 
do  by  a  meeting  at  Manchester,  I  have  no  notion.  The  only  really  prac- 
tical thing  that  I  can  think  of  would  be  sending  me  lots  of  money  to  spend 
in  getting  all  the  drawings  I  can  of  the  old  thing  before  it  goes.  I  don't 
believe  we  can  save  it  by  any  protests."  See  the  Birmingham  Daily  Mail, 
Nov.  27,  1879.  The  reader  is  also  referred  to  "  Fors  Clavigera,"  New 
Series,  Letter  the  Fourth,  pp.  125-6. 

The  meeting  in  Oxford  alluded  to  above  was  held  in  the  Sheldonian 
Theatre  on  November  15,  1879.  Amongst  the  principal  speakers  were  the 
Dean  of  Christ  Church  (in  the  chair).  Dr.  Acland,  the  Professor  of  Fine 
Art  (Mr.  W.  B.  Richmond),  Mr.  Street,  Mr.  William  Morris,  and  Mr. 
Burne  Jones. 


LETTERS   ON   SCIENCE, 


I. 

GEOLOGICAL. 

Thk  Conformation  of  the  Alps.     1864. 

Concerning  Glaciers.    1864. 

English  versi/s  Alpine  Geology.     1864. 

Concerning  Hydrostatics.     1864. 

James  David  Forbes  :    His  Real  Greatness.     1874. 

II. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

On  Reflections  in  Water.     1844. 

On  the  Reflection  of  Rainbows.     1861. 

A  Landslip  nt:ar  Giagnano.     1841. 

On  the  Gentian.     1857. 

On  the  Study  of  Natural  History.     (Undated.) 


I. 

GEOLOGICAL. 

[From  "The  Reader,"  November  12,  ISM.] 

THE  CONFORMATION  OF  THE  ALPS. 

Denmark  Hill,  IQth  Naveinber,  1864. 

My  attention  has  but  now  been  directed  to  tlie  letters  in 
your  October  numbers  on  the  subject  of  the  forms  of  the 
Alps."^  I  have,  perhaps,  some  claim  to  be  heard  on  this  ques- 
tion, having  spent,  out  of  a  somewhat  busy  life,  eleven 
summers  and  two  winters  (the  winter  work  being  especially 
useful,  owinor  to  the  definition  of  inaccessible  ledo-es  of  strata 
by  new-fallen  snow)  in  researches  among  the  Alps,  directed 
solely  to  the  questions  of  their  external  form  and  its  mechani- 
cal causes ;  while  I  left  to  other  geologists  the  more  disputable 
and  ditficult  problems  of  relative  ages  of  beds. 

I  say  "more  disputable"  because,  however  complex  tlie 
phases  of  mechanical  action,  its  general  nature  admits,  among 
the  Alps,  of  no  question.  The  forms  of  the  Alps  are  quite 
vi-nbly  owing  to  the  action  (how  gradual  or  prolonged  cannot 
yet  be  determined)  of  elevatory,  contractile,  and  expansive 
forces,  followed  by  that  of  currents  of  water  at  various 
temperatures,  and  of  prolonged  disintegration — ice  having  had 
small  share  in  modif3^ing  even  the  higher  ridges,  and  none  in 
causing  or  forming  the  valleys. 

*  The  Radcr  of  October  IT)  contained  an  article  "  On  the  Conformation 
of  the  Alps,"  to  which  in  the  following  issue  of  the  journal  (October  22) 
Sir  Roderick Murchison  replied  in  a  letter  dated  "Torquay,  16th  October," 
and  entitled  "On  the  Excavation  of  Lake-Basins  in  solid  rocks  by 
Glaciers,"  the  possibility  of  which  he  altogether  denied. 


17-i  LETTERS    ON   SCIENCE.  [1864. 

The  reason  of  the  extreme  difficulty  in  tracing  the  com- 
bination of  these  several  operative  causes  in  any  given  instance, 
is  that  the  effective  and  destructive  drainage  by  no  means 
follows  the  leading  fissures,  but  tells  fearfully  on  the  softer 
rocks,  sweeping  away  inconceivable  volumes  of  these,  while 
fissures  or  faults  in  the  harder  rocks  of  quite  primal  structural 
importance  may  be  little  deepened  or  widened,  often  even 
unindicated,  by  subsequent  aqueous  action.  I  have,  however, 
described  at  some  length  the  commonest  structural  and  sculp- 
tural phenomena  in  the  fourth  volume  of  "  Modern  Painters," 
and  I  gave  a  general  sketch  of  the  subject  last  year  in  my 
lecture"^  at  the  Koyal  Institution  (fully  reported  in  the 
Journal  de  Geneve  of  2d  September,  1863),  but  I  have  not  yet 
thrown  together  the  mass  of  material  in  my  possession,  because 
our  leading  chemists  are  only  now  on  the  point  of  obtaining 
some  data  for  the  analysis  of  the  most  important  of  all  forces — 
that  of  the  consolidation  and  crystallization  of  the  metamorphic 
rocks,  causing  them  to  alter  their  bulk  and  exercise  irresistible 
and  irregular  pressures  on  neighboring  or  incumbent  beds. 

But,  even  on  existing  data,  the  idea  of  the  excavation  of 
valleys  by  ice  has  become  one  of  quite  ludicrous  untenableness. 
At  this  moment,  the  principal  glacier  in  Chamouni  pours  itself 
down  a  slope  of  twenty  degrees  or  more  over  a  rock  tw^o  thou- 
sand feet  in  vertical  height ;  and  just  at  the  bottom  of  this  ice- 
cataract,  where  a  water-cataract  of  equal  power  would  have 
excavated  an  almost  fathomless  pool,  the  ice  simply  accumu- 
lates a  heap  of  stones,  on  the  top  of  which  it  rests. 

The  lakes  of  any  hill  country  lie  in  what  are  the  isolated 
lowest  (as  its  summits  are  the  isolated  highest)  portions  of  its 
broken  surface,  and  ice  no  more  engraves  the  one  than  it 
builds  the  other.    But  how  these  hollows  were  indeed  first  dug, 


*  "On  the  Forms  of  the  Stratified  Alps  of  Savoy,"  delivered  on  June 
5,  1863.  The  subject  was  treated  under  three  heads.  1.  The  material  of 
the  Savoy  Alps.  2.  The  mode  of  their  formation.  3.  The  mode  of  their 
subsequent  sculpture.  (See  the  report  of  the  lecture  in  the  "Proceedings 
of  the  Royal  Institution,"  1863,  vol.  iv.,  p.  142.  It  was  also  printed  by  the 
Institution  in  a  separate  form,  p.  4.) 


1864.]  CONCERNING    GLACIERS.  lYS 

we  know  as  yet  no  more  than  how  the  Athintic  was  dug ;  and 
the  hasty  expression  by  geologists  of  their  fancies  in  such  mat- 
ters cannot  be  too  much  deprecated,  because  it  deprives  their 
science  of  the  i-espect  really  due  to  it  in  the  minds  of  a  lai'ge 
portion  of  the  public,  who  know,  and  can  know,  nothing  of  its 
established  principles,  while  they  can  easily  detect  its  specula- 
tive vanity.  There  is  plenty  of  work  for  us  all  to  do,  without 
losing  time  in  speculation  ;  and  when  we  have  got  good  sec- 
tions across  the  entire  chain  of  the  Alps,  at  intervals  of  twenty 
miles  apart,  from  Nice  to  Innspruch,  and  exhaustive  maps  and 
sections  of  the  lake-basins  of  Lucerne,  Annecy,  Como,  and 
Garda,  we  shall  have  won  the  leisure,  and  may  assume  the 
right,  to  try  our  w4ts  on  the  formative  question. 

J.  RUSKJN.* 


[From  "The  Reader,"  November  26,  1864.] 


CONCERN  ma   GLACIERS. 


Denmark  Hill,  November  21. 

I  AM  obliged  to  your  Scottish  correspondent  for  the  courtesy 
with  which  he  expresses  himself  towards  me ;  and,  as  his  letter 
refers  to  several  points  still  (to  my  no  little  surprise)  in  dis- 
pute among  geologists,  you  will  perhaps  allow  me  to  occupy, 
in  reply,  somewhat  more  of  your  valuable  space  than  I  had 
intended  to  ask  for. 

I  say  "  to  my  no  little  surprise,"  because  the  great  prin- 
ciples of  glacial  action  have  been  so  clearly  stated  by  their 
discoverer,  Forbes,  and  its  minor  phenomena  (though  in  an 
envious  temper,  which,  by  its  bitterness,  as  a  pillar  of  salt,  has 

*In  reply  to  this  letter,  the  Reader  oi  November  19,  1864,  published  one 
from  a  Scottish  correspondent,  signed  "Tain  Caimbeul,"  the  writer  of 
which  declared  that,  whilst  he  looked  on  Mr.  Ruskin  "as  a  thoroughly 
reliable  guide  in  all  that  relates  to  the  external  aspects  of  the  Alps,"  he 
could  not  "  accept  his  leadership  in  questions  of  political  economy  or  the 
mechanics  of  glacier  motion." 


176  LETTERS    OX    SCIENCE.  [1864. 

become  the  sorrowful  monument  of  the  discovery  it  denies)  * 
so  carefully  described  by  Agassiz,  that  I  never  thought  there 
would  be  occasion  for  nmcli  talk  on  the  subject  henceforward. 
As  much  as  seems  now  necessary  to  be  said  I  will  say  as  briefly 
as  I  can. 

What  a  river  carries  fast  at  the  bottom  of  it,  a  glacier 
carries  slowly  at  the  top  of  it.  This  is  the  main  distinction 
between  their  agencies.  A  piece  of  rock  which,  falling  into  a 
strong  torrent,  would  be  perhaps  swept  down  half  a  mile  in 
twenty  minutes,  delivering  blows  on  the  rocks  at  the  bottom 
audible  like  distant  heavy  cannon,f  and  at  last  dashed  into 
fragments,  which  in  a  little  while  will  be  rounded  pebbles 
(having  done  enough  damage  to  everything  it  has  touched  in 
its  course) — this  same  rock,  I  say,  falling  on  a  glacier,  lies  on 
the  top  of  it,  and  is  thereon  carried  down,  if  at  fullest  speed, 
at  the  rate  of  three  yards  in  a  week,  doing  usually  damage  to 
nothing  at  all.  That  is  the  primal  difference  between  the 
work  of  water  and  ice ;  these  further  differences,  however, 
follow  from  this  first  one. 

Though  a  glacier  never  rolls  its  moraine  into  pebbles,  as  a 
torrent  does  its  shingle,  it  torments  and  teases  the  said  moraine 
vei-y  sufficiently,  and  without  intermission.  It  is  always  mov- 
ing it  on,  and  melting  from  under  it,  and  one  stone  is  always 
toppling,  or  tilting,  or  sliding  over  another,  and  one  company 
of  stones  crashing  over  another,  with  staggering  shift  of  heap 
behind.  Now,  leaving  out  of  all  account  the  pulverulent 
effect  of  original  precipitation  to  glacier  level  from  two  or 
three  thousand  feet  above,  let  the  reader  imagine  a  mass  of 
sharp  granite  road-metal  and  paving-stones,  mixed  up  with 
boulders  of  any  size  he  can  think  of,  and  with  wreck  of  softer 
rocks  (micaceous  schists  in  quantities,  usually),  the  whole,  say, 

t  Even  in  lower  Apennine,  ^'  Dat  sonitum  saxis,  et  torto  ver- 
tice  torrens."J: 

*  See  below,    "Forbes:   his  real  greatness,"   pp.    187  seqq.,   and  the 
references  given  in  the  notes  there. 
X  Virgil,  ^neid,  vii.  567. 


1864.]  CONCERNING    GLACIERS.  ITT 

half  a  quarter  of  a  niilo  wide,  and  of  variable  tliickness,  from 
mere  skin-deep  mock  moraine  on  mounds  of  unsuspected  ice 
— treacherous,  shadow-begotten — to  a  railroad  embankment, 
passe ?ifft/'-eiuhi\nkuient,  one  oternnl  collapse  of  unconditional 
ruin,  rotten  to  its  heart  with  frost  and  thaw  (in  regions  on  the 
edge  of  each),  and  withering  sun  and  waste  of  oozing  ice ; 
fancy  all  this  heaved  and  shovelled,  slowly,  by  a  gang  of 
a  thousand  Irish  laborers,  twenty  miles  downhill.  You  will 
conjecture  there  may  be  some  dust  developed  on  the  w^ay  ? — 
some  at  the  hill  bottom  i  Yet  thus  you  will  have  but  a  dim 
idea  of  the  daily  and  linal  results  of  the  movements  of  glacier 
moraines — beautiful  result  in  granite  and  slate  dust,  delivered 
by  the  torrent  at  last  in  banks  of  black  and  white  slime,  recov- 
ering itself,  far  away,  into  fruitful  fields,  and  level  floor  for 
human  life. 

Xow  all  this  is  utterly  independent  of  any  action  what- 
soever by  the  ice  on  its  sustaining  rocks.  It  has  an  action  on 
these  indeed ;  but  of  this  limited  nature  as  compared  with  that 
of  water.  A  stone  at  the  bottom  of  a  stream,  or  deep-sea  cur- 
rent, necessarily  and  always  presses  on  the  bottom  with  the 
weight  of  the  column  of  water  above  it — plus  the  excess  of  its 
own  weight  above  that  of  a  bulk  of  water  equal  to  its  own  ; 
but  a  stone  under  a  glacier  may  be  hitched  or  suspended  in 
the  ice  itself  for  long  spaces,  not  touching  bottom  at  all.  AVhen 
di'0})ped  at  last,  the  weight  of  ice  may  not  come  upon  it  for 
years,  for  that  weight  is  only  carried  on  certain  spaces  of  the 
rock  bed ;  and  in  those  very  spaces  the  utmost  a  stone  can  do 
is  to  press  on  the  bottom  with  the  force  necessary  to  driv^e  the 
given  stone  into  ice  of  a  given  density  (usually  porous) ;  and, 
with  this  maximum  pressure,  to  move  at  the  maximum  rate  of 
about  a  third  of  an  inch  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour  I  Try  to  saw 
a  piece  of  marble  through  (with  edge  of  iron,  not  of  soppy  ice, 
for  saw\  and  with  shar])  flint  sand  for  felspar  slime),  and  move 
your  saw  at  the  rate  of  an  inch  in  three-quarters  of  an  Innir, 
and  see  what  lively  and  progressive  work  you  will  make  of 
it! 

I  say  "  a  piece  of  marble ;"  but  your  permanent  glaoiei-- 


178  LETTERS    OX    SCIEXCE.  [18B4. 

bottom  is  rarely  so  soft — for  a  glacier,  though  it  acts  slowly  by 
friction,  can  act  vigorously  by  dead-weight  on  a  soft  rock,  and 
(with  fall  previously  provided  for  it)  can  clear  masses  of  that 
out  of  the  way,  to  some  purpose.  There  is  a  notable  instance 
of  this  in  the  rock  of  which  your  correspondent  speaks,  under 
the  Glacier  des  Bois.  His  idea,  that  the  glacier  is  deep  above 
and  thins  out  below,  is  a  curious  instance  of  the  misconception 
of  glacier  nature,  from  which  all  that  Forbes  has  done  cannot 
yet  quite  clear  the  public  mind,  nor  even  the  geological  mind. 
A  glacier  never,  in  a  large  sense,  thins  out  at  all  as  it  expires. 
It  flows  level  everywhere  for  its  own  part,  and  never  slopes 
but  down  a  slope,  as  a  rapid  in  water.  Pour  out  a  pot  of  the 
thickest  old  white  candied,  but  still  fluent,  honey  you  can  buy, 
over  a  heap  of  stones,  arranged  as  you  like,  to  imitate  rocks." 
Whatever  the  honey  does  on  a  small  scale,  the  glacier  does  on 
a  large ;  and  you  may  thus  study  the  glacier  phenomena  of 
current — though,  of  course,  not  those  of  structure  or  fissure 
— at  your  ease.  But  note  this  specially :  When  the  honey  is 
at  last  at  rest,  in  whatever  form  it  has  taken,  you  will  see  it 
terminates  in  tongues  with  low  rounded  edges.  The  possible 
height  of  these  edges,  in  any  fluid,  varies  as  its  viscosity ;  it  is 
some  quarter  of  an  inch  or  so  in  water  on  dry  ground ;  the 
most  fluent  ice  will  stand  at  about  a  hundred  feet.  Next,  from 
this  outer  edge  of  the  stagnant  honey,  delicately  skim  or  thin 
off  a  little  at  the  top,  and  see  what  it  will  do.  It  will  not 
stand  in  an  inclined  plane,  but  fill  itself  up  again  to  a  level 
from  behind.  Glacier  ice  does  exactly  the  same  thing;  and 
this  filling  in  from  behind  is  done  so  subtly  and  delicately, 
that,  every  ^vinter,  the  whole  glacier  surface  rises  to  replace 
the  summer's  waste,  not  with  progressive  wave,  as  "  twice  a 
day  the  Severn  fills ;"  but  with  silent,  level  insurrection,  as  of 
ocean-tide,  the  gray  sea-crystal  passes  by.  And  all  the  struc- 
tural phenomena  of  the  ice  are  modified  by  this  mysterious 
action. 

Your  correspondent  is  also  not  aware  that  the  Glacier  des 

*See  "  Deucalion,"  vol.  i.  p.  93. 


1864.]  CONCERXIXG    GLACIERS.  179 

Bois  gives  a  very  practical  and  outspoken  proof  of  its  shallow- 
ness opposite  the  Montanvert.  Very  often  its  torrent,  under 
wilful  touch  of  Lucina-sceptre,  leaps  to  the  light  at  the  top  of 
the  rocks  instead  of  their  base."^  That  fiery  Arveron,  some- 
times, hearing  from  reconnoitring  streamlets  of  a  nearer  way 
down  to  the  valley  than  the  rounded  ice-curve  under  the 
Chapeau,  fairly  takes  bit  in  teeth,  and  flings  itself  out  over  the 
brow  of  the  rocks,  and  down  a  ravine  in  them,  in  the  wildest 
cataract  of  white  thunder-clouds  (endless  in  thunder,  and  with 
quiet  fragments  of  rainbow  for  lightning),  that  I  have  ever 
blinded  myself  in  the  skirts  of. 

These  bare  rocks,  over  which  the  main  river  sometimes 
falls  (and  outlying  streamlets  always)  are  of  firm-grained, 
massively  rounded  gneiss.  Above  them,  I  have  no  douljt, 
once  extended  the  upper  covering  of  fibrous  and  amianthoidal 
schist,  which  forms  the  greater  part  of  the  south-eastern  flank 
of  the  valley  of  Chamouni.  The  schistose  gneiss  is  continuous 
in  direction  of  bed,  with  the  harder  gneiss  below.  But  the 
outer  portion  is  soft,  the  inner  hard,  and  more  granitic.  This 
outer  portion  the  descending  glaciers  have  always  stripped 
right  off  down  to  the  hard  gneiss  below,  and  in  places,  as 
immediately  above  the  Montanvert  (and  elsewhere  at  the 
brows  of  the  valley),  the  beds  of  schistose  gneiss  are  crushed 
and  bent  outwards  in  a  mass  (I  believe)  by  the  weight  of  the 
old  glacier,  for  some  fifty  feet  within  their  surface.  This 
looks  like  work ;  and  work  of  this  sort,  when  it  had  to  be 
done,  the  glaciers  were  well  up  to,  bearing  down  such  soft 
masses  as  a  strong  man  bends  a  poplar  sapling ;  but  by  steady 
push  far  more  than  by  friction.  You  may  bend  or  break  your 
sapling  with  bare  hands,  but  try  to  rub  its  bark  off  with  your 
bare  hands ! 

When  once  the  icQ,tvit/i  strength  always  dejpendent  on  pre- 

♦There  twice  a  day  the  Severn  fills; 
The  salt  sea-water  passes  by, 
And  hushes  half  the  babbling  Wye, 
And  makes  a  silence  in  the  hills. 

Tennyson,  "  In  Memoriam,"  xix. 


180  LETTERS   01^   SCIENCE.  [1864. 

existent  jyTecipice,  lias  cleared  such  obstacles  out  of  its  way, 
and  made  its  bed  to  its  liking,  there  is  an  end  to  its  manifest 
and  effectively  sculptural  power.  I  do  not  believe  the  Glacier 
des  Bois  has  done  more  against  some  of  the  granite  surfaces 
beneath  it,  for  these  four  thousand  years,  than  the  drifts  of 
desert  sand  have  done  on  Sinai.  Be  that  as  it  may,  its  power 
of  excavation  on  a  level  is  proved,  as  I  showed  in  my  last 
letter,  to  be  zero.  Your  correspondent  thinks  the  glacier 
power  vanishes  towards  the  extremity  ;  but  as  long  as  the  ice 
exists,  it  has  the  same  progressive  energy,  and,  indeed,  some- 
times, with  the  quite  terminal  nose  of  it,  will  plough  a  piece 
of  ground  scientifically  enough  ;  but  it  never  digs  a  hole :  the 
stream  ahvays  comes  from  under  it  full  speed  downhill.  IS'ow, 
whatever  the  dimensions  of  a  glacier,  if  it  dug  a  big  hole,  like 
the  Lake  of  Geneva,  when  it  was  big,  it  would  dig  a  little  hole 
when  it  was  little — (not  that  this  is  ahvays  safe  logic,  for  a 
little  stone  will  dig  in  a  glacier,  and  a  large  one  build ;  but  it 
is  safe  within  general  limits) — which  it  never  does,  nor  can, 
biit  subsides  gladly  into  any  hole  prepared  for  it  in  a  quite 
placid  manner,  for  all  its  fierce  looks. 

I  find  it  difficult  to  stop,  for  your  correspondent,  little  as 
he  thinks  it,  has  put  me  on  my  ow^n  ground.  I  was  foiled  to 
wi-ite  upon  Art  by  an  accident  (the  public  abuse  of  Turner) 
when  I  was  two-and-twenty ;  but  I  had  written  a  "  Minera- 
logical  Dictionary''  as  far  as  C,  and  invented  a  shorthand 
symbolism  for  crystalline  forms,  before  1  was  fourteen  :  and 
have  been  at  stony  work  ever  since,  as  I  could  find  time, 
silently,  not  caring  to  speak  much  till  the  chemists  had  given 
me  more  help.*  For,  indeed,  I  strive,  as  far  as  may  be,  not 
to  speak  of  anything  till  I  know  it ;  and  in  that  matter  of 
Political  Economy  also  (though  forced  in  like  manner  to  write 
of  that  by  unendurable  circumfluent  fallacy),  I  know^  my 
ground  ;  and  if  your  present  correspondent,  or  any  other,  will 
meet  me  fairly,  I  w^ill  give  them  uttermost  satisfaction  upon 
any  point  they  doubt.     There  is  free  challenge :  and  in  the 

*  See  "Deucalion,"  vol.  i.  p.  3  (Introduction). 


1864.J  ENGLISH    VS.    ALl'INK    GEOLOGY.  181 

kniglit  of  Snowdouirs  vows  (looking  tirst  curefully  to  see  that 
the  rock  be  not  a  glacier  boulder), 


"  This  rock  shall  fy 
From  its  firm  base,  as  soou  as  I.' 


J.    KUSKIN.* 


[From  "The  Reader,"  December  3,  1864.] 

ENGLISH  VERSUS  ALPINE  GEOLOGY. 

Denmark  Hill,  2^th  Nov. 
I  SCARCELY  know  what  reply  to  make,  or  whether  it  is  neces- 
sary to  reply  at  all,  to  the  letter  of  Mr.  Jukes  in  your  last 
number.  There  is  no  antagonism  between  his  views  and  mine, 
though  he  seems  henrtily  to  desire  that  there  should  be,  and 
with  no  conceivable  motive  but  to  obtain  some  appearance  of 
it  suppresses  the  latter  half  of  the  sentence  he  quotes  from  my 
letter.+  It  is  true  that  he  writes  in  willing  ignorance  of  the 
Alps,  and  I  in  unwilling  ignorance  of  the  Wicklow  hills ;  but 
the  only  consequent  discrepancy  of  thought  or  of  impression 
between  us  is,  that  Mr.  Jukes,  examining  (by  his  own  account) 
very  old  hills,  which  have  been  all  but  washed  away  to  nothing, 
naturally,  and  rightly,  attributes  their  present  form,  or  want 
of  form,  to  their  prolonged  ablutions,  while  I,  examining  new 
and  lofty  hills,  of  which,  though  much  has  been  carried  away, 
much  is  still  left,  as  naturallv  and  rifi^htlv  ascribe  a  2:reat  part 

*  Following  this  letter  in  the  same  number  of  the  Binder  was  one  from 
the  well-known  geologist  Mr.  Joseph  Beete  Jukes,  F.R.S.,  who,  writing 
from  "  Selly  Oak,  Birmingham,  Nov.  22,"  described  as  "the  originator  of 
the  discussion."  He  therefore  was  no  doubt  the  author  of  the  article  in  the 
Reader  alluded  to  above  (p.  173,  note),     ^[r.  Jukes  died  in  1869. 

f  The  following  is  the  sentence  from  Mr.  Jukes'  letter  alluded  to; 
"Therefore  when  Mr.  Ruskin  says  that  '  the  forms  of  the  Alps  are  quite 
visibly  owing  to  the  action  of  elevatory,  contractile,  and  expansive  forces,' 
I  would  entreat  him  to  listen  to  those  who  have  had  their  vision  corrected 
by  the  laborious  use  of  chain  and  theodolite  and  protractor  for  many  toil- 
some years  over  similar  forms." 


182  LETTERS   ON    SCIENCE.  [1864. 

of  their  aspect  to  the  modes  of  their  elevation.  Tlie  Alp-bred 
geologist  has,  however,  this  advantage,  that  (especially  if  he 
happen  at  spare  times  to  have  been  interested  in  manual  arts) 
he  can  hardly  overlook  the  effects  of  denudation  on  a  moun- 
tain-chain which  sustains  Venice  on  the  delta  of  one  of  its 
torrents,  and  Antwerp  on  that  of  another ;  but  the  English 
geologist,  however  practised  in  the  detection  and  measurement 
of  faults  filled  in  by  cubes  of  fluor,  may  be  pardoned  for  dimly 
appreciating  the  structure  of  a  district  in  which  a  people  strong 
enough  to  lay  the  foundation  of  the  liberties  of  Europe  in  a 
single  battle,"^  was  educated  in  a  fissure  of  the  Lower  Chalk. 

I  think,  however,  that,  if  Mr.  Jukes  can  succeed  in  allaying 
his  feverish  thirst  for  battle,  he  will  wish  to  withdraw  the 
fourth  paragraph  of  his  letter,t  and,  as  a  general  formula,  even 
the  scheme  which  it  introduces.  That  scheme,  sufiiciently 
accurate  as  an  expression  of  one  cycle  of  geological  action,  con- 
tains little  more  than  was  known  to  all  leading  geologists  five-, 
and-twenty  years  ago,  when  I  was  w^orking  hard  under  Dr. 
Buckland  at  Oxford ;  ^  and  it  is  so  curiously  unworthy  of  the 
present  state  of  geological  science,  that  I  believe  its  author,  in 
his  calmer  moments,  will  not  wish  to  attach  his  name  to  an 
attempt  at  generalization  at  once  so  narrow,  and  so  audacious. 
My  experience  of  mountain-foi-m  is  probably  as  much  more 
extended  than  his,  as  my  disposition  to  generalize  respecting 
it  is  less  ;  §  and,  although  indeed  the  apparent  limitation  of  the 

*  The  Battle  of  Sempach  (?).  See  the  letters  on  "  The  Italian  Question," 
at  the  beginning  of  the  second  volume. 

f  To  the  effect  that  "the  form  of  the  ground  is  the  result  wholl}'  of 
denudation."  For  the  "scheme,"  consisting  of  ten  articles,  see  the  note 
§  below. 

t  Dr.  William  Buckland,  the  geologist,  and  at  one  time  Dean  of  West- 
minster.    He  died  in  1856.     See  "Fors  Clavigera,"  1873,  Letter  34,  p.  19. 

§  This  and  the  following  sentences  allude  to  parts  of  the  above-men- 
tioned scheme.  "The  whole  question,"  wrote  Mr.  Jukes,  "depends  on 
the  relative  dates  of  production  of  the  lithological  composition,  the  petro- 
logical  structure,  and  the  form  of  the  surface."  The  scheme  then  attempts 
to  sketch  the  "order  of  the  processes  which  formed  these  three  things," 
in  ten  articles,  of  which  the  following  are  specially  referred  to  by  Mr,  Rus- 
kin:  "1.  The  formation  of  a  great  series  of  stratified  rocks  on  tlie  bed  of 


1864.]  ENGLISH    VS.    ALPINE    GEOLOGY.  183 

statement  wliicli  he  half  quotes  (probably  owinii:  to  his  general 
love  of  denudation)  from  my  last  letter,  to  the  ehain  of  the 
Alps,  was  intended  only  to  attach  to  the  words  ''(piite  visibly," 
yet,  had  I  myself  expanded  that  statement,  I  >hould  not  liave 
assumed  the  existence  of  a  sea,  to  relieve  me  from  the  ditliculty 
of  accountino:  for  the  existence  of  a  lake ;  I  should  not  have 
assumed  that  all  mountain-formations  of  investiture  were 
marine  ;  nor  claimed  the  possession  of  a  great  series  of  stratified 
rocks  without  inquiring  where  they  were  to  come  from.  I 
should  not  have  thought  "  even  more  than  one"  an  adequate 
expression  for  the  possible  number  of  elevations  and  depressions 
which  may  have  taken  place  since  the  beginning  of  time  on 
the  mountain-chains  of  the  world  ;  nor  thought  myself  capable 
of  compressing  into  Ten  Articles,  or  even  into  Thirty-nine,  my 
conceptions  of  the  working  of  the  Power  which  led  forth  the 
little  hills  like  lambs,  while  it  rent  or  established  the  founda- 
tions of  the  earth  ;  and  set  their  birth-seal  on  the  forehead  of 
each  in  the  inlinitudes  of  aspect  and  of  function  which  range 
between  the  violet-dyed  banks  of  Thames  and  Seine,  and  the 
vexed  Fury-Tower  of  Cotopaxi. 

Xot  but  that  large  generalizations  are,  indeed,  possible  with 
respect  to  the  diluvial  phenomena,  among  which  my  antagonist 
has  pursued  his — (scarcely  amphibious?) — investigations.  The 
effects  of  denudation  and  deposition  are  unvarying  everywhere, 
and  have  been  watched  with  terror  and  gratitude  in  all  ages. 
In  physical  mythology  they  gave  tusk  to  the  Grteae,  claw  to 
the  Gorgons,  bull's  frontlet  to  the  floods  of  Aufldus  and  Po. 
They  gave  weapons  to  the  wars  of  Titans  against  Gods,  and 
lifeless  seed  of  life  into  the  hand  of  Deucalion.  Herodotus 
"  rightly  spelled"  of  them,  where  the  lotus  rose  from  the  dust 
of  Nile  and  leaned  upon  its  dew ;  Plato  rightly  dreamed  of 
them  in  his  great  vision  of  the  disrobing  of  the  Acropolis  to  its 
naked  marble ;  the  keen  eye  of  Horace,  half  poet's,  half  farm- 

a  sea.  ...  3.  The  possible  intrusion  of  great  masses  of  granitic  rock" 
in  more  or  less  fluent  state;  and  6,  7,  8,  9,  which  dealt  with  alternate  ele- 
vation and  depression,  of  which  there  might  be  "even  more  than  one 
repetition." 


^'S4:  LETTERS   Oif   SCIENCE.  [1864. 

er's  (albeit  unaided  by  theodolite),  recognized  tliem  alike  wliere 
the  risen  brooks  of  YuUombrosa,  anddst  the  mountain-clamors, 
tossed  their  cliamped  shingle  to  the  Etrurian  sea,  and  in  the 
uncoveted  wealth  of  the  pastures, 

"Quae  Liris  quiets 
Mordet  aqu^,  taciturnus  amnis."* 

But  the  inner  structure  of  the  mountain-chains  is  as  varied  as 
tlieir  substance  ;  and  to  this  day,  in  some  of  its  mightier  develop- 
ments, so  little  understood,  that  my  Neptunian  opponent  him- 
self, in  his  address  delivered  at  Cambi'idge  in  1862,  speaks  of 
an  arrangement  of  strata  which  it  is  difficult  to  traverse  ten 
miles  of  Alpine  limestone  without  finding  an  example  of,  as 
beyond  the  limits  of  theoretical  imagination.f 

I  feel  tempted  to  say  more ;  but  I  have  at  present  little 
time  even  for  useful,  and  none  for  wanton,  controversy. 
Whatever  information  Mr.  Jukes  can  afford  me  on  these  sub- 
jects (and  I  do  not  doubt  he  can  afford  me  much),  I  am  ready 
to  receive,  not  only  without  need  of  his  entreaty,  but  with 
sincere  thanks.  If  he  likes  to  try  his  powers  of  sight,  "as 
corrected  by  the  laborious  use  of  the  protractor,"  against  mine, 
I  will  in  humility  abide  the  issue.  But  at  present  the  question 
before  the  house  is,  as  I  understand  it,  simply  whether  glaciers 
excavate  lake-basins  or  not.  That,  in  spite  of  measurement 
and  survey,  here  or  elsewhere,  seems  to  remain  a  question. 
May  we  answer  the  iirst,  if  answeraljle  ?  That  determined,  I 
think  I  might  furnish  some  other  grounds  of  debate  in  this 
notable  cause  of  Peebles  against  Plainstanes,  pi-ovided  that  Mr. 
Jukes  will  not  in  future  think  his  seniority  gives  him  the  right 
to  answer  me  with  disparagement  instead  of  instruction,  and 
will  bear  with  the  English  "  student's"  Aveakness,  which  induces 


*  See  Herodotus,  ii.  92;  Plato,  Critias,  112;  and  Horace,  Od.  i.  31. 

f  The  address  was  delivered  by  Mr.  Jukes  as  President  of  the  Geological 
Section  of  the  British  Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science,  which 
met  in  1862  at  Cambridge.  (See  the  Report  of  the  Association,  vol.  xxxii. 
p.  54.) 


1864.]  COXCERNIXG   HYDROSTATICS.  185 

me,  usually,  to  wish  rather  to  begin  by  shooting  my  elephant 
than  end  by  describing  it  out  of  my  moral  consciousness.* 

J.  liuSKIN. 


[From  "  The  Reader,"  December  10,  1864,] 

CONCERN' IXG  HYDROSTATICS. 

Norwich,  oth  December. 
Your  pages  are  not,  I  presume,  intended  for  the  dissemina- 
tion of  the  elements  of  physical  science.  Your  correspondent 
"M.  A.  C."  has  a  good  wit,  and,  by  purchasing  any  common 
treatise  on  the  barometer,  may  discover  the  propriety  of  exer- 
cising it  on  subjects  with  which  he  is  acquainted.  "  G.  M." 
deserves  more  attention,  the  confusion  in  his  mind  between 
increase  of  j^ressure  and  increase  of  density  being  a  very  com- 
mon one.f  It  may  be  enough  to  note  for  him,  and  for  those 
of  your  readers  whom  his  letter  may  have  eml)arrassed,  that  in 
any  incompressible  liquid  a  body  of  greater  specific  gravity 
than  the  liquid  will  sink  to  any  depth,  because  the  column 
which  it  forms,  together  with  the  vertical  column  of  the  liquid 
above  it,  always  exceeds  in  total  weight  the  column  formed  by 
the  equal  bulk  of  the  liquid  at  its  side,  and  the  vertical  column 
of  liquid  above  that.  Deep-sea  soundings  would  be  otherwise 
impossible.  "  G  .M."  may  find  the  explanation  of  the  other 
phenomena  to  which  he  alludes  in  any  elementary  work  on 

*  Mr.  Jukes'  letter  bad  concluded  by  recommending  Englisb  geologists 
to  pursue  tbeir  studies  at  borne,  on  tbe  ground  tliat  "  a  student,  commcnc 
ing  to  learn  comparative  anatomy,  does  not  tliink  it  necessary  to  go  to 
Africa  and  kill  an  elepbant."  In  the  following  number  of  the  Reader  (Dec. 
10)  Mr.  Jukes  wrote,  in  answer  to  tbe  present  letter,  that  he  had  not  intended 
to  imply  any  hostility  towards  Mr.  Ruskin,  with  whose  next  letter  the  dis- 
cussion ended. 

f  "  M.  A.  C."  wrote  "Concerning  Stones,"  and  dealt — or  attempted  to 
deal — with  "atmospheric  pressure"  in  addition  to  the  pressure  of  water 
alluded  to  in  ;Mr.  Ruskin's  letter  of  November  26.  The  letter  signed 
"G.  M."  was  entitled  "  ^Ir.  Ruskin  on  Glaciers;"  see  next  note.  Both 
letters  appeared  in  the  Reader  of  December  3,  1864. 


186  LETTERS   ON   SCIENCE.  [1864. 

hydrostatics,  and  will  discover  on  a  little  reflection  that  the 
statement  in  my  last  letter  ^  is  simply  true.  Expanded,  it  is 
merely  that,  when  we  throw  a  stone  into  water,  we  substitute 
pressure  of  stone-surface  for  pressure  of  water-surface  through- 
out the  area  of  horizontal  contact  of  the  stone  with  the  ground, 
and  add  the  excess  of  the  stone's  weight  over  that  of  an  equal 
bulk  of  water. 

It  is,  however,  very  difficult  for  me  to  understand  how  any 
person  so  totally  ignorant  of  every  circumstance  of  glacial 
locality  and  action,  as  "  G.  M."  shows  himself  to  be  in  the  para- 
graph beginning  "It  is  very  evident,"  could  have  had  the 
courage  to  write  a  syllable  on  the  subject.  I  w^ill  waste  no  time 
in  reply,  but  will  only  assure  him  (with  reference  to  his  asser- 
tion that  I  "get  rid  of  the  rooks,"  etc.),  that  I  never  desire  to 
get  rid  of  anything  but  error,  and  that  I  should  be  the  last 
person  to  desire  to  get  rid  of  the  glacial  agency  by  friction,  as  I 
was,  I  believe,  the  first  to  reduce  to  a  diagram  the  probable 
stages  of  its  operation  on  the  bases  of  the  higher  Alpine 
aiguilles,  t 

Permit  me  to  add,  in  conclusion,  that  in  future  I  can  take 
no  notice  of  any  letters  to  which  the  writers  do  not  think  fit 
to  attach  their  names.  There  can  be  no  need  of  initials  in  sci- 
entific discussion^  except  to  shield  incompetence  or  license 
discourtesy. 

J.  RrSKDi. 

*  Not  in  the  "last  letter,"  but  in  the  last  but  one — see  ante,  p.  177,  "A 
stone  at  the  bottom  of  a  stream,"  etc.  The  parts  of  "  G.  M.'s"  letter  specially 
alluded  to  by  Mr.  Ruskin  are  as  follows  ; 

"  It  is  very  evident  that  the  nearer  the  source  of  the  glacier,  the  steeper 
will  be  the  angle  at  which  it  advances  from  above,  and  the  greater  its  power 
of  excavation.  .  .  .  Mr.  Ruskin  gets  rid  of  the  rocks  and  debris  on  the 
under  side  of  the  glacier  by  supposing  that  they  are  pressed  beyond  the 
range  of  action  in  the  solid  body  of  the  ice;  but  there  must  be  a  limit  to 
this,  however  soft  the  matrix." 

t  See  "  Modern  Pamters,"  Part  v.,  chap.  13,  "  On  the  Sculpture  Moun- 
tains," vol.  IV.  p.  174. 


1874]  JAMES   DAVID    FORBES.  187 

[From  "  Rendu's  Theory  of  the  Glaciers  of  Savoy,"  Macmillan,  1874.] 

JAMES  DAVID  FORBES:  HIS  REAL   GREATNESS* 

The  incidental  passage  in  ''  Fors,"  hastily  written,  on  a  con- 
temptible issue,  does  not  in  the  least  indicate  my  sense  of  the 
real  position  of  James  Forbes  among  the  men  of  his  day.  I 
have  asked  his  son's  f  permission  to  add  a  few  words  expressive 
of  my  deeper  feelings. 

For  indeed  it  seems  to  me  that  all  these  questions  as  to 
priority  of  ideas  or  observ^ations  are  beneath  debate  among  noble 
persons.  What  a  man  like  Forbes  first  noticed,  or  demonstrated, 
is  of  no  real  moment  to  his  memory.  What  he  was,  and  how 
he  taught,  is  of  consummate  moment.  The  actuality  of  his 
personal  power,  the  sincerity  and  wisdom  of  his  constant  teach- 
ing, need  no  applause  from  the  love  they  justly  gained,  and  can 
sustain  no  diminution  from  hostility ;  for  their  proper  honor  is 
in  their  usefulness.  To  a  man  of  no  essential  power,  the  acci- 
dent of  a  discovery  is  apotheosis  ;  to  him,  the  former  knowl- 
edge of  all  the  sages  of  earth  is  as  though  it  were  not ;  he 
calls  the  ants  of  his  own  generation  round  him,  to  observe  how 
he  flourishes  in  his  tiny  forceps  the  grain  of  sand  he  has 
imposed  upon  Pelion.  But  from  all  such  vindication  of  the 
claims  of  Forbes  to  mere  discovery,  I,  his  friend,  would,  for  my 

*  In  connection  with  the  question  of  glacier-motion,  Mr.  Ruskin's  esti- 
mate of  Professor  Forbes  and  his  work  is  here  reprinted  from  Rendu's 
"  Glaciers  of  Savoy"  (Macmillan,  1874).  pp.  205-207.  For  a  passage  on  the 
same  subject  which  was  reprinted  in  the  "  Glaciers  of  Savoy,"  in  addition 
to  the  new  matter  republished  here,  and  for  a  statement  of  the  course  of 
glacier-science,  and  the  relation  of  Forbes  to  Agassiz,  the  reader  is  referred 
to  "Fors  Clavigera."  1873.  Letter  34,  pp.  17-26.  The  "incidental  passage" 
consists  of  a  review  of  Professor  Tyndall's  "Forms  of  Water"  (London, 
1872),  and  the  "contemptible  issue"  was  that  of  his  position  and  Forbes 
amongst  geological  discoverers. 

f  George  Forbes,  B.A.,  Professor  of  Natural  Philosophy  in  the  Ander- 
sonian  University,  Gla.sgow,  and  editor  of  "  The  Glaciers  of  Savoy." 


188  LETTERS   OK   SCIEXCE.  [1874. 

own  part,  proudly  abstain.  I  do  not  in  the  slightest  degree 
care  whether  he  was  the  first  to  see  this,  or  the  first  to  say  that, 
or  how  many  common  persons  had  seen  or  said  as  mnch  before. 
"What  I  rejoice  in  knowing  of  him  is  that  he  had  clear  eyes  and 
open  heart  for  all  things  and  deeds  appertaining  to  his  life ; 
that  whatever  he  discerned,  was  discerned  impartially ;  what  he 
said,  was  said  securely ;  and  that  in  all  functions  of  thouo^ht, 
experiment,  or  communication,  he  w^as  sure  to  be  eventually 
right,  and  serviceable  to  mankind,  whether  out  of  the  treasury 
of  eternal  knowledge  he  brought  forth  things  new  or  old. 

This  is  the  essential  diffei-ence  between  the  work  of  men  of 
true  genius  and  the  agitation  of  temporary  and  popular  power. 
The  first  root  of  their  usefulness  is  in  subjectiofl  of  their  vanity 
to  their  purpose.  It  is  not  in  calibre  or  range  of  intellect  that 
men  vitally  differ ;  every  phase  of  mental  character  has  honora- 
ble office ;  but  the  vital  difference  between  the  strong  and  the 
weak — or  let  me  say  rather,  between  the  availing  and  valueless 
intelligence — is  in  the  relation  of  the  love  of  self  to  the  love  of 
the  subject  or  occupation.  Many  an  Alpine  traveller,  many  a 
busy  man  of  science,  volubly  rej^resent  to  us  their  pleasure  in 
the  Alps  ;  but  I  scarcely  recognize  one  who  would  not  willingly 
see  them  all  ground  down  into  gravel,  on  condition  of  his  being 
the  first  to  exhibit  a  pebble  of  it  at  the  Eoyal  Institution. 
"Whereas  it  may  be  felt  in  any  single  page  of  Forbes'  writing, 
or  De  Saussure's,  that  they  love  crag  and  glacier  for  their  own 
sake's  sake  ;  that  they  question  their  secrets  in  reverent  and 
solemn  thirst :  not  at  all  that  they  may  connnunicate  them  at 
breakfast  to  the  readers  of  the  Daily  Xews — and  that,  although 
there  were  no  news,  no  institutions,  no  leading  articles,  no 
medals,  no  money,  and  no  mob,  in  the  world,  these  men  would 
still  labor,  and  be  glad,  though  all  their  knowledge  was  to  rest 
with  them  at  last  in  the  silence  of  the  snows,  or  only  to  be 
taught  to  peasant  children  sitting  in  the  shade  of  pines. 

And  whatever  Forbes  did  or  spoke  during  liis  noble  life 
was  in  this  manner  patiently  and  permanently  true.  The  pas- 
sage of  his  lectures  in  which  he  shows  the  folly  of  Macaulay's 
assertion  that  "  The  giants  of  one  generation  are  the  pigmies  of 


1874]  JAMES    DAVID    FORBES.  lb\) 

the  next,"*  beautiful  in  itself,  is  more  interesting  yet  in  the 
indication  it  gives  of  the  general  grasp  and  melodious  tone  of 
Forbes'  revetment  intellect,  as  opposed  to  the  discordant  inso- 
lence of  modernism.  His  mind  grew  and  took  color  like  an 
Alpine  flower,  rooted  on  rock,  and  perennial  in  tiower ;  wliile 
Macaulay's  swelled  like  a]nill'-l)all  in  an  unwholesome  pasture, 
and  projected  itself  far  round  in  deleterious  dust. 

*This  saying  of  Macaulay's  occurred  iu  an  address  which,  as  M.P.  for 
that  city,  he  delivered  at  the  opening  of  the  Edinburgh  Philosophical  Insti- 
tution, iu  1846  (Xov.  4).  Forbes'  criticism  of  it  and  of  the  whole  address 
may  be  found  in  a  lecture  introductory  to  a  course  on  Natural  Philosophy, 
delivered  before  the  University  of  Edinburgh  (Nov,  1  and  2,  1S48),  and 
entitled  "  The  Danger  of  Superficial  Knowledge;"  under  which  title  it  was 
afterwards  printed,,  together  with  a  newspaper  report  of  INIacaulay's  address 
(London  and  Edinburgh,  1849).  In  the  edition  of  Macaulay*s  speeches 
revised  by  himself,  the  sentence  in  question  is  omitted,  though  others  of  a 
like  nature,  such  as  "The  profundity  of  one  age  is  the  shallowness  of  the 
next,"  are  retained,  and  the  whole  argument  of  the  address  remains  the 
same.  (See  Macaulay's  Works,  8  vol.  ed.,  Longmans,  1866.  Vol.  viii.  p. 
880,  "The  Literature  of  Great  Britain.")  For  a  second  mention  of  this 
saying  by  Mr.  Kuskin,  see  also  "  Remarks  addressed  to  the  ]\Iansfield  Art 
Night  Class,"  1873,  now  reprinted  in  "  A  Joy  for  Ever  '  (Ruskin's  Works, 
vol.  xi.  p.  201). 

The  following  are  parts  of  the  passage  (extending  over  some  pages)  in 
Forbes'  lecture  alluded  to  by  Mr.  Ruskin: 

"How  false,  then,  as  well  as  arrogant,  is  the  self-gratulation  of  those, 
■who,  forgetful  of  the  struggles  and  painful  efforts  by  which  knowledge  is 
i    increased,  would  place  themselves,  by  virtue  of  their  borrowed  acquire- 
i    ments,  in  the  same  elevated  position  with  their  great  teachers — nay,  who, 
'    perceiving  the  dimness  of  light  and  feebleness  of  grasp,  with  which,  often 
I    at  first,  great  truths  have  been  perceived  and  held,  find  food  for  pride  in 
'    the  superior  clearness  of  their  vision  and  tenacity  of  their  apprehension!" 
Then,  after  quoting  some  words  from  Dr.  Whewell's  "Philosophy  of  the 
Inductive  Sciences,"  vol.  ii.  p.  525,  and  after  some  further  remarks,  the 
lecturer  thus  continued:  "  The  activity  of  mind,  the  earnestness,  the  strug- 
gle  after  truth,   the   hopeless  perplexity  breaking  up  gradually  into  the 
fulness  of  perfect  apprehension, — the  dread  of  error,  the  victory  over  the 
imagination  in  discarding  hypotheses,  the  sense  of  weakness  and  humility 
arising  from  repeated  disappointments,  the  yearnings  after  a  fuller  revela- 
tion, and  the  sure  conviction  which  attends  the  final  advent  of  knowledge 
sought  amidst  difficulties  and  disappointments, — these  are  the  lessons  and 
the  rewards  of  the  discoverers  who  first  put  truth  within  our  reach,  but  of 
which  we  who  receive  it  at  second-hand  can  form  but  a  faint  and  lifeless 
I    conception."    (See  pp.  39-41  of  "  The  Danger  of  Superficial  Knowledge.") 


190  LETTERS    OX    SCIENCE.  '  [1874. 

I  had  intended  saying  a  few  words  more  touching  the  dif- 
ference in  temper,  and  probity  of  heart,  between  Foi'bes  and 
Agassiz,  as  manifested  in  the  documents  now  *  laid  before  the 
public.  And  as  far  as  my  own  feehngs  are  concerned,  the 
death  of  Agassiz  f  would  not  have  caused  my  withholding  a  i 
word.  For  in  all  utterance  of  blame  or  praise,  I  have  striven 
always  to  be  kind  to  the  living — just  to  the  dead.  But  in 
deference  to  the  wish  of  the  son  of  Forbes,  I  keep  silence :  I 
willingly  leave  sentence  to  be  pronounced  by  time,  above  their 
two  graves. 

John  Euskin. 

The  following  letters,:]:  one  from  Forbes  to  myself,  written 
ten  years  ago,  and  the  other  from  one  of  his  pupils,  received 
by  me  a  few  weeks  since,  must,  however,  take  their  due  place 
among  the  other  evidence  on  which  such  judgment  is  to  be 
given.  J.  R. 

*  In  the  edition  of  Rendu's  "Glaciers  of  Savoy"  already  alluded  to. 

f  Forbes  died  Dec.  31,  1868  ;  Agassiz  in  1873  ;  and  De  Saussure  in  1845. 

X  The  letter  from  Forbes  to  Mr.  Ruskin  (dated  December  2,  1864)  was 
presumably  elicited  by  the  allusions  to  Forbes  in  Mr.  Ruskin's  letter  to  the 
Reader  of  November  26,  1874  (see  ante,  pp.  259  and  263).  "Advancing 
j-'ears  and  permanently  depressed  state  of  health,"  ran  the  letter,  "have 
taken  the  edge  off  the  bitterness  which  the  injustice  I  have  experienced 
caused  me  during  many  years.  But  .  .  .  the  old  fire  revives  within  me 
when  I  see  any  one  willing  and  courageous,  like  you,  to  remember  an  old 
friend,  and  to  show  that  you  do  so." — The  second  letter  speaks  of  the 
writer's  "  boyisJi  enthusiasm"  for  Agassiz,  an  expression  to  which  Mr. 
Ruskin  appends  this  note:  "  The  italics  are  mine.  I  think  this  incidental 
and  naive  proof  of  the  way  in  which  Forbes  had  spoken  of  Agassiz  to  his 
class,  of  the  greatest  value  and  beautiful  interest. — J.  R." 


II. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 


[From  "The  Artist  and  Amateur's  Magazine"  (edited  by  E.  V.  Rippingille),  February, 

1844,  pp.  314-319.1 


REFLECTIONS  IN   WATER* 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Artist  and  Amateufs  Magazine." 

Sir  :  The  phenomena  of  light  and  shade,  rendered  to  the  eye 
by  the  surface  or  substance  of  water,  are  so  intricate  and  so 
multitudinous,  that  had  I  wished  fully  to  investigate,  or  even 
fully  to  state  them,  a  volume  instead  of  a  page  would  have  been 
required  for  the  task.  In  the  paragraphs  f  which  I  devoted  to 
the  subject  I  expressed,  as  briefly  as  possible,  the  laws  which 
are  of  most  general  application — with  which  artists  are  indeed 
60  universally  familiar,  that  I  conceived  it  altogether  unneces- 
sary to  prove  or  support  them :  but  since  I  have  expressed  them 
in  as  few  words  as  possible,  I  cannot  afford  to  have  any  of  those 

*  In  the  first  edition  of  "Modern  Painters"  (vol.  i.  p.  330)  it  was  stated 
that  "the  horizontal  lines  cast  by  clouds  upon  the  sea  are  not  shadows,  but 
reflections;"  and  that  "on  clear  water  near  the  eye  there  can  never  be 
even  the  appearance  of  shadow."  This  statement  being  questioned  in  a 
letter  to  the  Art  Union  Journal  (November,  1843),  and  that  letter  being 
itself  criticised  in  a  review  of  "Modern  Painters"  in  the  Artist  and  Ania- 
te^ir's  Magazine,  p.  263  (December,  1843).  there  appeared  in  the  last-named 
periodical  two  letters  upon  the  subject,  of  which  one  was  from  J.  H.  Maw, 
the  correspondent  of  the  Art  Union,  and  the  other — that  reprinted  here — a 
reply  from  "The  Author  of  'Modern  Painters.'" 

t  The  passages  in  "Modern  Painters"  referred  to  in  this  letter  were 
considerably  altered  and  enlarged  in  later  editions  of  the  work,  and  the 
exact  words  quoted  are  not  to  be  found  in  it  as  finally  revised.  The  reader 
is,  however,  referred  to  vol.  i.,  part  ii.,  §  v.,  chap,  i.,  "Of  Water  as  painted 
by  the  Ancients,"  in  whatever  edition  of  the  book  he  may  chance  to  meet 
with  or  possess. 


192  LETTEKS   02^   SCIEN-CE.  [1844. 

words  missed  or  disregarded ;  and  therefore  when  I  say  that  ^f 
on  clear  water,  ?iear  the  eye,  there  is  no  shadow,  I  must  not  be  ^^: 
understood  to  mean  that  on  muddy  water, /b^/*  from  the  eye,  ^ 
there  is  no  shadow.  As,  however,  your  correspondent  appears  '"'! 
to  deny  my  position  in  toto,  and  as  many  persons,  on  their  first  '"" 
glance  at  the  subject,  might  be  inclined  to  do  the  same,  you  will  ^^' 
perhaps  excuse  me  for  occupying  a  page  or  two  with  a  more  '^ 
explicit  statement,  both  of  facts  and  principles,  than  my  limits  *''' 
admitted  in  the  "  Modern  Painters."  ^" 

First,  for  the  experimental  proof  of  my  assertion  that  "  on  *' 
clear  water,  near  the  eye,  there  is  no  shadow."  Your  corre-  ^, 
spondent's  trial  with  the  tub  is  somewhat  cumbrous  and  incon-  ^ 
venient ;  *  a  far  more  simple  experiment  wdll  settle  the  matter.  ^ 
Fill  a  tumbler  with  water;  throw  into  it  a  narrow  strip  of  white  ^ 
paper ;  put  the  tumbler  into  sunshine ;  dip  your  finger  into  ^ 
the  water  between  the  paper  and  the  sun,  so  as  to  throw  a  ^ 
shadow  across  the  paper  and  on  the  water.  The  shadow  will 
of  course  be  distinct  on  the  paper,  but  on  the  water  absolutely  ^ 
and  totally  invisible.  |   ^ 

This  simple  trial  of  the  fact,  and  your  explanation  of  the 
principle  given  in  your  ninth  number,f  are  suflicient  proof  and 
explanation  of  my  assertion;  and  if  your  correspondent  requires 
authority  as  well  as  ocular  demonstration,  he  has  only  to  ask 
Stanfield  or  Copley  Fielding,  or  any  other  good  painter  of  sea ; 
the  latter,  indeed,  was  the  person  who  first  pointed  out  the  fact 
to  me  when  a  boy.  What  then,  it  remains  to  be  determined, 
are  those  lights  and  shades  on  the  sea,  which,  for  the  sake  of 
clearness,  and  because  they  appear  such  to  the  ordinary  observer, 
I  have  spoken  of  as  "  horizontal  lines,"  and  which  have  every 


*  See  the  ArtiM  and  Amateur'' 8  Magazine,  p.  313,  where  the  author  of  the 
letter,  to  which  this  is  a  reply,  adduced  in  support  of  his  views  the  follow- 
ing experiment,  viz. :  to  put  a  tub  filled  with  clear  water  in  the  sunlight, 
and  then  taking  an  opaque  screen  with  a  hole  cut  in  it,  to  place  the  same 
in  such  a  position  as  to  intercept  the  light  falling  upon  the  tub.  Then,  he 
argued,  cover  the  hole  over,  and  the  tub  will  be  in  shadow  ;  uncover  it 
again,  and  a  patch  of  light  will  fall  on  the  water,  proving  that  water  is  not 
"insusceptible  of  light  as  well  as  shadow." 

f  In  the  review  of  "Modern  Painters"  mentioned  above. 


\ 


1844.]  REFLECTIONS    IX    WATER.  193 

appearance  of  being  ca^t  by  the  clouds  like  real  shadows  i  I 
imagined  that  I  had  been  suthciently  explicit  on  this  subject 
both  at  pages  33U  and  363  :*  but  your  correspondent  appeai-s 
to  have  confused  himself  by  inaccurately  receiving  the  term 
shadow  as  if  it  meant  darkness  of  any  kind  ;  whereas  my  second 
sentence — "every  darkness  on  water  is  reflection,  not  shadow" 
— might  have  show^n  him  that  1  used  it  in  its  particular  sense, 
as  meaning  the  absence  of  positive  light  on  a  visible  surface. 
Thus,  in  endeavoring  to  support  his  assertion  that  the  shadows 
on  the  sea  are  as  distinct  as  on  a  grass  fleld,  he  says  tlmt  they 
are  so  by  contrast  with  the  ''  liglit  reflected  from  its  polished 
surface ;"  thus  showing  at  once  that  he  has  been  speaking  and 
thinking  all  along,  not  of  shadow,  but  of  the  absence  of  reflected 
light — an  absence  which  is  no  more  shadow  than  the  absence  of 
the  image  of  a  piece  of  w^iite  paper  in  a  mirror  is  shadow^  on 
the  mii-ror. 

The  question,  therefore,  is  one  of  terms  rather  than  of 
things ;  and  before  proceeding  it  will  be  necessary  for  me  to 
make  your  correspondent  understand  thoroughly  what  is  meant 
by  the  term  shadow  as  opposed  to  that  of  reflection. 

Let  us  stand  on  the  sea-shore  on  a  cloudless  ni^ht,  with  a 
full  moon  over  the  sea,  and  a  swell  on  the  water.  Of  course  a 
long  line  of  splendor  will  be  seen  on  the  waves  under  the  moon, 
reaching  from  the  horizon  to  our  very  feet.  But  are  those 
waves  between  the  moon  ^wdiw^  actually  movQ  illuminated  than 
any  other  part  of  the  sea  ?  Not  one  whit.  The  whole  surface 
of  the  sea  is  under  the  same  full  liglit,  but  the  weaves  between 
the  moon  and  us  are  the  only  ones  which  are  in  a  position  to 
reflect  that  light  to  our  eyes.  The  sea  on  both  sides  of  that 
path  of  light  is  in  perfect  darkness — almost  black.  But  is  it 
so  from  shadow  ?  Not  so,  for  there  is  nothing  to  intercept  the 
moonlight  from  it :  it  is  so  from  position,  because  it  cannot 
reflect  any  of  the  rays  which  fall  on  it  to  our  eyes,  but  reflects 
instead  the  dark  vault  of  the  night  sky.     Both  the  darkness 

*  Of  The  first  edition  of  the  first  volume  of  "Modern  Painters."  The 
size  of  the  book  (and  consequently  the  paging)  was  afterwards  altered  to 
suit  the  engravings  contained  in  the  last  tliree  volumes 


194  LETTERS   ON"   SCIENCE.  [1844.   , 

and  the  light  on  it,  therefore  —  and  they  are  as  violently 
contrasted  as  may  well  be  —  are  nothing  but  reflections,  the 
whole  surface  of  the  water  being  under  one  blaze  of  moon- 
light, entirely  unshaded  by  any  intervening  object  whatso- 
ever.* 

Now,  then,  we  can  understand  the  cause  of  the  chiaro-scuro 
of  the  sea  by  daylight  with  lateral  sun.  AVhere  the  sunlight 
reaches  the  water,  every  ripple,  wave,  or  swell  reflects  to  the 
eye  from  some  of  its  planes  either  the  image  of  the  sun  oi- 
some  portion  of  the  neighboring  bright  sky.  "Where  the  cloud 
interposes  between  the  sun  and  sea,  all  these  luminous  reflec- 
tions are  prevented,  and  the  raised  planes  of  the  waves  reflect 
only  the  dark  under-surface  of  the  cloud ;  and  hence,  by  the 
multiplication  of  the  images,  spaces  of  light  and  shade  are  pro- 
duced, which  lie  on  the  sea  precisely  in  the  position  of  real  or 
positive  lights  and  shadows — corresponding  to  the  outlines  of 
the  clouds — laterally  cast,  and  therefore  seen  in  addition  to, 
and  at  the  same  time  with,  the  ordinary  or  direct  reflection, 
vigorously  contrasted,  the  lights  being  often  a  blaze  of  gold, 
and  the  shadows  a  dark  leaden  gray ;  and  yet,  I  repeat,  they 
are  no  more  real  lights,  or  real  shadows,  on  the  sea,  than  the 
image  of  a  black  coat  is  a  shadow  on  a  mirror,  or  the  image  of 
white  paper  a  light  upon  it. 

Are  there,  then,  no  shadows  whatsoever  upon  the  sea? 
IS'ot  so.  My  assertion  is  simply  that  there  are  none  on  clear 
water  near  the  eye.  I  shall  briefly  state  a  few  of  the  circum- 
stances which  give  rise  to  real  shadow^  in  distant  effect. 

I.  Any  admixture  of  opaque  coloring  matter,  as  of  mud, 
chalk,  or  powdered  granite  renders  w^ater  capable  of  distinct 
shadow,  which  is  cast  on  the  earthy  and  solid  particles  sus- 
pended in  the  liquid.  l!^one  of  the  seas  on  our  south-eastern 
coast  are  so  clear  as  to  be  absolutely  incapable  of  shade ;  and 
the  faint  tint,   though   scarcely  perceptible   to    a  near   ob- 

*  It  may  be  worth  noting  that  the  optical  delusion  above  explained  is 
described  at  some  length  by  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  ("  The  Study  of  Sociol- 
ogy," p.  191,  London,  1874)  as  one  of  the  commonest  instances  of  popular 
iiinorance. 


844.1  REFLECTIONS    IN     WATER.  15J5 


erver,"  is  sufficiently  manifest  when  seen  in  large  extent  from 
distance,  especially  when  contrasted,  as  yuiir  correspondent 
ays,  with  reflected  lights.     This  was  one  reason  fur  my  intro- 
ucing  the  words — '*  near  the  eye.'' 

There  is,  however,  a  peculiarity  in  the  appearances  of  such 
ihadows  which  requires  especial  notice.  It  is  not  merely  the 
:ransparency  of  water,  but  its  polished  surface,  and  consequent 
•eflective  power,  which  render  it  incapable  of  shadow.  A  per- 
Ifectly  opaque  body,  if  its  power  of  reflection  be  perfect,  I'c- 
beives  no  shadow  (this  I  shall  presently  prove; ;  and  therefore, 
in  any  lustrous  body,  tlie  incapability  of  shadow  is  in  propor- 
tion to  the  power  of  reflection.  Now  the  power  of  reflection 
in  water  varies  with  the  angle  of  the  impinging  ray,  being  of 
coui*se  greatest  when  that  angle  is  least :  and  thus,  when  we 
look  along  the  water  at  a  low  angle,  its  power  of  reflection 
maintains  its  incapability  of  shadow  to  a  considerable  extent, 
in  spite  of  its  containing  suspended  opaque  matter ;  whereas, 
\\  hen  we  look  down  upon  water  from  a  height,  as  we  then 
receive  from  it  only  rays  which  have  fallen  on  it  at  a  large 
angle,  a  great  number  of  those  rays  are  unreflected  from  the 
surface,  but  penetrate  beneath  the  surface,  and  are  then  re- 
}  fleeted  f  from  the  suspended  opa(pie  matter :  thus  rendering 


Mi 
loot 


*  Of  course,  if  water  be  jierfectly  foul,  like  that  of  the  Rhine 
or  Arve,  it  receives  a  shadow  nearly  as  well  as  mud.  Yet  tlie 
succeeding  observations  on  its  reflective  power  are  applicable  to 
it,  even  in  this  state. 

t  It  must  always  be  remembered  that  there  are  two  kinds  of 

reflection, — one  from  polished  bodies,  giving  back  rays  of  light 

unaltered;  the  other  from  unpolished  bodies,  giving  back  rays 

of  light  altered.     By  the  one  reflection  we   see  the  images  of 

other  objects  on  the  surface  of  the  reflecting  object;  by  the  other 

we  arc  made  aware  of  that  surface  itself.    The  diiference  between 

J  these  two  kinds  of  reflection  has  not  been  well  worked  by  writers 

jl  on  optics;  but  the  great  distinction  between  them  is,  that  the 

rough  body  reflects  most  rays  when  the  angle  at  which  the  rays 

impinge  is  largest,  and  the  i)olished  body  when  the  angle  is 

i  smallest.     It  is  the  reflection  from  polished  bodies  exclusively 


J  96  LETTERS   ON    SCIENCE.  [184l.i 

sliadows  clearly  visible  wliicli,  at  a  small  angle,  would  have 
been  altogether  unperceived. 

II.  But  it  is  not  merely  the  presence  of  opaque  matter 
which  renders  shadows  visible  on  the  sea  seen  from  a  heisfht. 
The  eye,  when  elevated  above  the  water,  receives  rays  reflected 
from  the  bottom,  of  which,  when  near  the  water,  it  is  insensi- 
ble. I  have  seen  the  bottom  at  seven  fathoms,  so  that  I  could 
count  its  pebbles,  from  the  cliffs  of  the  Cornish  coast ;  and  the 
broad  effect  of  the  light  and  shade  of  the  bottom  is  discernible 
at  enormous  depths.  In  fact,  it  is  difficult  to  say  at  what 
depth  the  rays  returned  from  the  bottom  become  absolutely 
ineffective — perhaps  not  until  we  get  fairly  out  into  blue  water. 
Hence,  with  a  w^hite  or  sandy  shore,  shadows  forcible  enough 
to  afford  conspicuous  variety  of  color  may  be  seen  from  a 
height  of  two  or  three  hundred  feet. 

III.  The  actual  color  of  the  sea  itself  is  an  important  cause 
of  shadow  in  distant  effect.     Of  the  ultimate  causes  of  local 
color  in  water  I  am  not  ashamed  to  confess  my  total  ignorance, 
for  I  believe  Sir  David  Brewster  himself  has  not  elucidated'} 
themo      Every  river  in  Switzerland  has  a  different  hue.      The  ji 
lake  of  Geneva,  commonly  blue,  appears,  under  a  fresh  breeze,  f 
striped  with  blue  and  bright  red ;  and  the  hues  of  coast-sea  are  | 


which  I  usually  indicate  by  the  term;  and  that  from  rough 
bodies  I  commonly  distinguish  as  ''positive  light;"  but  as  I 
have  here  used  the  term  in  its  general  sense,  the  explanation  of  j  ,11 
the  distinction  becomes  necessary.  All  light  and  shade  on  ; '  I 
matter  is  caused  by  reflection  of  some  kind;  and  the  distinction 
made  throughout  this  paper  between  reflected  and  positive  light, 
and  between  real  and  pseudo  shadow,  is  nothing  more  than  the 
distinction  between  two  kinds  of  reflection. 

I  believe  some  of  Bouguer's  *  experiments  have  been  rendered 
inaccurate — not  in  their  general  result,  nor  in  ratio  of  quanti-  , 
ties,  but  in  the  quantities  themselves — by  the  difficulty  of  distin- 
guishing between  the  two  kinds  of  reflected  rays. 

*  Pierre  Bouguer,  author  of,  amongst  other  works,  the  *'  Traite  d'Optique 
sur  la  Gradation  de  la  Lumi^re."    He  was  born  in  1698,  and  died  in  1758. 


k. 


J44.]  REFLECTIONS    IN    WATER.  197 


IS  various  as  those  of  a  doli)hin  ;  luit,  whatever  be  the  cause  of 
;heir  variety,  their  intensity  is,  of  course,  dependent  on  the 
Dresence  of  sun-light.     The  sea  under  shade  is  commonly  of 

II  cold  gray  hue  ;  in  sun-light  it  is  susceptible  of  vivid  and 
Bxquisite  coloring :  and  thus  the  forms  of  clouds  are  traced  on 
its  sui'face,  not  by  light  and  shade,  but  by  variation  of  color 
by  grays  opj^osed  to  greens,  blues  to  rose-tints,  etc.  All  such 
phenomena  are  chielly  visible  from  a  height  and  a  distance ; 
and  thus  furnished  me  with  additional  reasons  for  introducing 
the  words — '*  near  the  eye." 

IV.  Local  color  is,  however,  the  cause  of  one  beautiful 
kind  of  chiaro-scuro,  visible  when  we  are  close  to  the  water — 
shadows  cast,  not  on  the  weaves,  but  through  them,  as  through 
misty  air.  When  a  wave  is  raised  so  as  to  let  the  sun-light 
through  a  portion  of  its  body,  the  contrast  of  the  transparent 
chrysoprase  green  of  the  illuminated  parts  with  the  darkness 
of  the  shadowed  is  exquisitely  beautiful. 

Hitherto,  however,  I  have  been  speaking  chiefly  of  the 
Tansjparency  of  water  as  the  source  of  its  incapability  of 
shadow.  I  have  still  to  demonstrate  the  effect  of  its  polished 
surface. 

Let  your  correspondent  |x>ur  an  ounce  or  two  of  quicksilver 
into  a  flat  white  saucer,  and,  throwing  a  strip  of  white  paper 
into  the  middle  of  the  mercmy,  as  before  into  the  water,  inter- 
pose an  upright  bit  of  stick  between  it  and  the  sun  :  he  will 
then  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  the  shadow  of  the  stick  sharply 
defined  on  the  paper  and  the  edge  of  the  saucer,  while  on  the 
intermediate  portion  of  mercury  it  will  be  totally  invisible." 
Mercury  is  a  perfectly  opaque  body,  and  its  incapability  of 
shadow  is  entirely  owing  to  the  perfection  of  its  polished  sur- 
face. Thus,  then,  whether  water  be  considered  as  transparent 
or  reflective  (and  according  to  its  position  it  is  one  or  the 
other,  or  partially  both — for  in  the  exact  degree  that  it  is  the 
one,  it  is  not  the  other),  it  is  equally  incapable  of  shadow.  But 
as  on  distant  water,  so  also  on  near  water,  when  broken,  pseudo 

*  The  mercury  must  of  course  be  perfectly  clean. 


198  LETTERS   ON   SCIEKCE.  [1844. 

shadows  take  place,  which  are  in  reality  nothing  more  than  th 
aggregates  of  reflections.    In  the  illuminated  space  of  the  wave, 
from  every  plane  turned  towards  the  sun  there  flashes  an  imag< 
of  the  sun ;  in  the  ^/^/i-illuminated  space  there  is  seen  on  every 
such  plane  only  the  dark  image  of  the  interposed  body.    Every 
wreath  of  the  foam,  every  jet  of  the  spray,  reflects  in  the  sun-  i 
light  a  thousand  diminished  suns,  and  refracts  their  rays  into  a 
thousand  colors ;  while  in  the  shadowed  parts  the  same  broken 
parts  of  the  wave  appear  only  in  dead,  cold  white ;  and  thus 
pseudo   shadows  are   caused,  occupying  the  position  of  real 
shadows,  deflned  in  portions  of  their  edge  with  equal  sharp- 
ness ;  and  yet,  I  repeat,  they  are  no  more  real  shadows  than 
the  image  of  a  piece  of  black  cloth  is  a  shadow  on  a  mirror. 

But  your  correspondent  will  say,  "  What  does  it  matter  to 
me,  or  to  the  artist,  whether  they  are  shadows  or  not?  They 
are  darkness,  and  they  supply  the  place  of  shadows,  and  that 
it  is  all  I  contend  for."  Not  so.  They  do  not  supply  the  place 
of  shadows ;  they  are  divided  from  them  by  this  broad  dis- 
tinction, that  while  shadow  causes  uniform  deepening  of  thai 
ground-tint  in  the  objects  which  it  affects,  these  pseudo  shad- 
ows are  merely  portions  of  that  ground-tint  itself  undeepened, 
but  cut  out  and  rendered  conspicuous  by  flashes  of  light  irregu- 
larly disposed  around  it.  The  ground-tint  both  of  shadowedl 
and  illumined  parts  is  precisely  the  same — a  pure  pale  gray,! 
catching  as  it  moves  the  hues  of  the  sky  and  clouds ;  but  on 
this,  in  the  illumined  spaces,  there  fall  touches  and  flashes  of 
intense  reflected  light,  which  are  absent  in  the  shadow.  If, 
for  the  sake  of  illustration,  we  consider  the  wave  as  hung  with 
a  certain  quantity  of  lamps,  irregularly  disposed,  the  shape  and 
extent  of  a  shadow  on  that  wave  will  be  marked  by  the  lamps 
being  all  put  out  within  its  influence,  while  the  tint  of  the 
water  itself  is  entirely  unaffected  by  it. 

The  works  of  Stanfield  will  supply  your  correspondent 
with  perfect  and  admirable  illustrations  of  this  principle.  His 
water-tint  is  equally  clear  and  luminous  whether  in  sunshine 
or  shade ;  but  the  whole  lustre  of  the  illumined  parts  is  attained 
by  bright  isolated  touches  of  reflected  light. 


1844.]  REFLECTIONS   IX    WATER.  199 

The  works  of  Turner  will  supply  us  with  still  more  striking 
examples,  especially  in  cases  where  slanting  sunbeams  are  cast 
from  a  low  sun  along  breakers,  when  the  shadows  will  be 
found  in  a  state  of  perpetual  transition,  now  defined  for  an 
instant  on  a  mass  of  foam,  then  lost  in  an  interval  of  smooth 
water,  then  coming  through  the  body  of  a  transparent  wave, 
then  passing  olf  into  the  air  upon  the  dust  of  the  spray — sup- 
plying, as  they  do  in  nature,  exhaustless  combinations  of  ethe- 
real beauty.  From  Turner's  habit  of  choosing  for  his  subjects 
sea  much  broken  with  foam,  the  shadows  in  his  works  are 
more  conspicuous  than  in  Stanfield's,  and  may  be  studied  to 
greater  advantage.  To  the  works  of  these  great  painters,  those 
of  Yandevelde  may  be  opposed  for  instances  of  the  impossible. 
The  black  shadows  of  this  latter  painter's  near  waves  supply 
us  with  innumerable  and  most  illustrative  examples  of  every- 
thing which  sea  shadows  are  not. 

Finally,  let  me  recommend  your  correspondent,  if  he  wishes 
to  obtain  perfect  know^ledge  of  the  effects  of  shadow  on  water, 
whether  calm  or  agitated,  to  go  through  a  systematic  examina- 
tion of  the  works  of  Turner.  He  will  find  evenj  phenomenon 
of  this  kind  noted  in  them  with  the  most  exquisite  fidelity. 
The  Alnwick  Castle,  with  the  shadow  of  the  bridge  cast  on 
the  dull  surface  of  the  moat,  and  mixing  with  the  reflection,  is 
the  most  finished  piece  of  water-painting  with  which  I  am 
acquainted.  Some  of  the  recent  Yenices  have  afforded  exquis- 
ite instances  of  the  change  of  color  in  water  caused  by  shadow, 
the  illumined  water  being  transparent  and  green,  while  in  the 
shade  it  loses  its  own  color,  and  takes  the  blue  of  the  sky. 

But  I  have  already.  Sir,  occupied  far  too  many  of  your 
valuable  pages,  and  I  must  close  the  subject,  although  hun- 
dreds of  points  occur  to  me  which  I  have  not  yet  illustrated.^ 
The  discussion  respecting  the  Grotto  of  Capri  is  somewhat 

*  Among  other  points,  I  have  not  explained  why  water,  though 
it  has  no  shadow,  has  a  dark  side.  The  cause  of  this  is  the  New- 
tonian law  noticed  below,  that  water  weakens  the  rays  passing 
through  its  mass,  though  it  reflects  none;  and,  also,  that  it  reflects 
rays  from  both  surfaces. 


•200  LETTERS   OJs^   SCIEXCE.  [1844. 

irrelevant,  and  I  will  not  enter  upon  it,  as  thousands  of  laws 
respecting  light  and  color  are  there  brought  into  play,  in  addi- 
tion to  the  water's  incapability  of  shadow.^  But  it  is  some- 
what singular  that  the  Newtonian  principle,  which  your  cor- 
respondent enunciates  in  conclusion,  is  the  vert/ cause  oi  the 
incapability  of  shadow  which  he  disputes.  I  am  not,  however, 
writing  a  treatise  on  optics,  and  therefore  can  at  present  do 
no  more  than  simply  explain  what  the  jS^ewtonian  law  actually 
signifies,  since,  by  your  correspondent's  enunciation  of  it,  "  pel- 
lucid substances  reflect  light  only  from  their  surfaces,"  an 
inexperienced  reader  might  be  led  to  conclude  that  opaque 
bodies  reflected  light  from  something  else  than  their  surfaces. 

The  law  is,  that  whatever  number  of  rays  escape  reflection 
at  the  surface  of  water,  pass  through  its  body  without  further 
reflection,  being  therein  weakened,  but  not  reflected ;  but  that, . 
where  they  pass  out  of  the  water  again,  as,  for  instance,  if  there 
be  air-bubbles  at  the  bottom,  giving  an  under-surface  to  the 
water,  there  a  number  of  rays  are  reflected  from  that  under- 
surface,  and  do  7iot  pass  out  of  the  water,  but  return  to  the 
eye ;  thus  causing  the  bright  luminosity  of  the  under  bubbles. 
Thus  water  reflects  from  both  its  surfaces — it  reflects  it  when 
passing  out  as  well  as  when  entering;  but  it  reflects  none 
whatever  from  its  own  interior  mass.  If  it  did,  it  would  be 
capable  of  shadow. 

I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir, 

Your  most  obedient  servant. 
The  Author  of  "Modern  Painters." 

*  The  review  of  "Modern  Painters"  had  mentioned  the  Grotto  of  Capri, 
near  Naples,  as  "a  very  beautiful  illustration  of  the  great  quantity  of  light 
admitted  or  contained  in  water,"  and  on  this  Mr.  J.  H.  Maw  had  commented. 


1861.]  REFLECTION    OF    KAIXBOWS    IN    WATER.  201 

[From  "  The  London  Review,"  May  16,  1861.] 

THE  REFLECTION  OF  RAINBOWS  IN  WATER* 

To  the  Editor  of  ' '  The  London  Review." 

Sir  :  1  do  not  think  there  is  much  difficulty  in  the  rainbow 
business.  We  cannot  see  the  reflection  of  the  same  rainbow 
which  we  behold  in  tlie  sky,  but  we  see  the  reflection  of 
another  invisible  one  within  it.  Suppose  a  and  b,  Fig.  1,  are 
two  falling  raindrops,  and  the  spectator  is  at  s,  and  x  y  is  the 
water  surface.     If  r  a  s  be  a  sun  ray  giving,  we  will  say,  tlie 


Fig.  1. 

red  ray  in  the  visible  rainbow,  the  ray,  b  c  s,  will  give  the 
same  red  ray,  reflected  from  the  water  at  c. 

It  is  rather  a  long  business  to  examine  the  lateral  angles, 
and  I  have  not  time  to  do  it ;  but  I  presume  the  result  would 
be,  that  if  a  m  h,  Fig.  2,  be  the  visible  rainbow,  and  x  y  the 
water  horizon,  the  reflection  will  be  the  dotted  line  c  e  dj 
reflecting,  that  is  to  say,  the  invisible  bow,  c  n  d\  thus,  the 

*  The  London  Reneio  of  May  4  contained  a  critique  of  the  Exhibition 
of  the  Society  of  AVater-colors,  which  included  a  notice  of  Mr.  Duncan's 
"Shiplake,  on  the  Thames"  (No.  52).  In  this  picture  the  artist  had  painted 
a  rainbow  reflected  in  the  water,  the  truth  of  which  to  nature  was  ques- 
tioned by  some  of  his  critics.  Mr.  Ruskin's  w^as  not  the  only  letter  in  sup- 
port of  the  picture's  truth. 


202  LETTERS  OK  SCIEKCE.  [1841. 

terminations  of  the  arcs  of  the  visible  and  reflected  bows  do 
not  coincide. 


Fig.  2. 

The  interval,  m  n^  depends  on  the  position  of  the  spectator 
with  respect  to  the  water  surface.  The  thing  can  hardly  ever 
be  seen  in  nature,  for  if  there  be  rain  enough  to  carry  the 
bow  to  the  water  surface,  that  surface  will  be  ruffled  by  the 
drops,  and  incapable  of  reflection. 

Whenever  I  have  seen  a  rainbow  over  water  (sea,  mostly), 
it  has  stood  on  it  reflectionless ;  but  interrupted  conditions  of 
rain  might  be  imagined  wliich  would  present  reflection  on  near 
surfaces. 

Always  very  truly  yours, 

J.  EUSKIN. 

nth  May,  1861. 


[From  •♦  The  Proceedings  of  the  Ashmolean  Society,"  May  10, 1841.] 
A  LANDSLIP  NEAR  OIAQNANO. 

"  The  Secretary  read  a  letter  *  from  J.  Euskin,  Esq.,  of 
Christ  Church,  dated  Naples,  February  7,  1841 ,  and  addressed 
to  Dr.  Buckland,f  giving  a  description  of  a  recent  landslip  near 

*  The  present  letter  is  the  earliest  in  date  of  any  in  these  volumes, 
f  See  note  to  p.  183. 


1841.]  A   LANDSLIP   KEAR   GIAGNANO.  203 

that  place,  which  had  occasioned  a  great  loss  of  life  :  it  occurred 
at  the  village  of  Giagnano,  near  Castel-a-mare,  on  the  22d  of 
January  last.  The  village  is  situated  on  the  slope  of  a  conical 
hill  of  limestone,  not  less  than  1400  feet  in  height,  and  composed 
of  thin  beds  similar  to  those  which  form  the  greater  part  of  the 
range  of  Sorrento.  The  hill  in  question  is  nearly  isolated, 
though  forming  part  of  the  range,  the  slope  of  its  sides  uniform, 
and  inclined  at  not  less  than  40°.  Assisted  by  projecting 
ledges  of  the  beds  of  rock,  a  soil  has  accumulated  on  this  slope 
three  or  four  feet  in  depth,  rendering  it  quite  smooth  and 
uniform.  The  higher  parts  are  covered  in  many  places  with 
bmshwood,  the  lower  with  vines  trellised  over  old  mulberry 
trees.  There  are  slight  evidences  of  recent  aqueous  action  on 
the  sides  of  the  hill,  a  few  gullies  descending  towards  the  east 
side  of  the  village.  After  two  days  of  heavy  rain,  on  the 
evening  of  January  22,  a  torrent  of  water  burst  do\\Ti  on  the 
village  to  the  west  of  these  gullies,  and  the  soil  accumulated 
on  the  side  of  the  hill  gave  way  in  a  wedge-shaped  mass,  the 
highest  point  being  about  600  feet  above  the  houses,  and  slid 
down,  leaving  the  rocks  perfectly  bare.  It  buried  the  nearest 
group  of  cottages,  and  remained  heaped  up  in  longitudinal 
layers  above  them,  whilst  the  water  ran  in  torrents  over  the 
edge  towards  the  plain,  sweeping  away  many  more  houses  in 
its  course.  To  the  westward  of  this  point  another  slip  took 
place  of  smaller  dimensions  than  the  first,  but  coming  on  a 
more  crowded  part  of  the  village,  overwhelmed  it  completely, 
occasioning  the  loss  of  116  lives." 


204  LETTERS  ON   SCIENCE.  [IBS'?. 

[From  "  The  Athenaeum,"  February  14, 1857.] 

THE   GENTIAN."^ 

Denmakk  Hill,  Feb.  10. 
If  jour  correspondent  "  Y.  L.  Y."  will  take  a  little  trouble 
in  inquiring  into  the  history  of  the  gentian,  he  will  find  that, 
as  is  the  case  with  most  other  flowers,  there  are  many  species 
of  it.  He  knows  the  dark  blue  gentian  {Gentiana  acaulis) 
because  it  grows,  under  proper  cultivation,  as  healthily  in 
England  as  on  the  Alps.  And  he  has  not  seen  the  pale  blue 
gentian  {Gentiana  verna)  shaped  like  a  star,  and  of  the  color 
of  the  sky,  because  that  flower  grows  unwillingly,  if  at  all, 
except  on  its  native  rocks.  I  consider  it,  therefore,  as  specially 
characteristic  of  Alpine  scenery,  while  its  beauty,  to  my  mind, 
far  exceeds  that  of  the  darker  species. 

I  have,  etc., 

J.    KUSKIN. 


[Date  and  place  of  original  publication  unknown.] 
OK  THE  STUDY  OF  NATURAL  HISTORY. 

To  Adam  '[y  kite,  of  Edinburgh. 

It  would  be  pleasing  alike  to  my  personal  vanity  and  to  the 
instinct  of  making  myself  serviceable,  which  I  will  fearlessly 
say  is  as  strong  in  me  as  vanity,  if  I  could  think  that  any  letter 
of  mine  would  be  helpful  to  you  in  the  recommendation  of  the 

*  In  the  "  Notes  on  the  Turner  Grallery  at  Marlborough  House,"  1856 
(p.  23),  Mr.  Ruskin  speaks  of  the  "pale  ineffable  azure"  of  the  gentian. 
The  present  letter  was  written  in  reply  to  one  signed  "  Y.  L.  Y."  in  the 
Athenmim  of  February  7,  1857,  in  which  this  expression  was  criticised.  In 
a  subsequent  issue  of  the  same  journal  (February  21)  Mr,  Ruskin's  querist 
denied  the  ignorance  imputed  to  him,  and  still  questioned  the  propriety  of 
calling  the  gentian  "  pale,"  without  at  the  same  time  distinguishing  the  two 
species. 


THE   STUDY   OF   NATURAL   HISTORY.  205 

study  of  natural  liistory,  as  one  of  the  best  elements  of  early 
as  of  late  education.  I  believe  there  is  no  child  so  dull  or  so 
indolent  but  it  may  be  roused  to  wholesome  exertion  by  putting 
some  practical  and  personal  work  on  natural  history  within  its 
range  of  daily  occupation  ;  and,  once  aroused,  few  pleasures 
are  so  innocent,  and  none  so  constant.  I  have  often  been 
unable,  through  sickness  or  anxiety,  to  follow  my  own  art 
work,  but  I  have  never  found  natural  history  fail  me,  either 
as  a  delight  or  a  medicine.  But  for  children  it  must  be  curtly 
and  wisely  taught.  "We  must  show  them  things,  not  tell  them 
names.  A  deal  chest  of  drawers  is  worth  many  books  to  them, 
and  a  well-guided  country  walk  worth  a  hundred  lectures. 

I  heartily  wish  you,  not  only  for  your  sake,  but  for  that  of 
the  young  thistle  buds  of  Edinburgh,  success  in  promulgating 
your  views  and  putting  them  in  practice. 

Always  believe  mc  faithfully  yours, 

J.  EUSKIN. 


END   OF    VOLUME   I. 


ARROWS   OF  THE   CHACE. 


ARROWS  OF  THE  ClIACE 


A  COLLECTIOX  OF  S(\\TTEUKI)  LKTTERS 
PUBLISHED  CHIEFLY  IX  THE   DAILY  NEAVSl'Al'KIJS 

1840  — 1880. 
BY 

JOH^^  ErSKIX,   LL.D.,   D.C.L., 

HONORARY  STUDENT  OF   CHRIST    CHURCH,  AND   HONORARY  FEIJ.(  tW  OF 
CORPUS  CHRISTI  COLLEGE,  OXFORD, 


AND  NOW  EDITED  BY 


Ax  Oxford  Pupil. 


WITH    ]*REFArp:    ]iY    THE    AUTHOR. 
YOLUME  II.-I.ETTEIIS  ON  POLrnCS.  ECONOMY,  AND  MISCELLANEOUS  MAHERS. 


M 


NEW  YORK : 

JOHN   WILEY   &   SOXS, 

15  ASTOR  PLACE. 

1881. 


"  I  NEVER  WROTE  A  LETTER  IN  MY  LIFE  WHICH  ALL  THE  WORLD  ARE 
NOT  WELCOME  TO  READ  IF  THEY  WILL." 

Fors  Clavigera,  Letter  59,  1875. 


S.  W.  Geken's  Son, 

Klectrotyper,  Printer  and  Binder, 

74  Beekman  Street, 

New  York. 


COXTEXTS  OF  VOLUME  11. 


PAGE 

CnRONOLOGICAL  LlST  OF  THE   LETTERS  CONTAINED   IN   VOL.    II  -  X 


Letters  on  Politics  and  War: 
The  Italian  Question.     1859. 

Three  letters  :  June  6 3 

June  15 8 

August  1 13 

The  Foreign  Policy  of  England.    1863 15 

The  Position  of  Denmark.     1864 17 

The  Jamaica  Insurrection.     1865               -----  20 
The  Franco-Prussian  War.     1870. 

Two  letters :  October  6 22 

October  7 25 

Modern  Warfare.     1876 29 

Letters  on  Political  Economy: 

The  Depreciation  of  Gold.     1863 37 

The  Law  of  Supply  and  Demand.     1864. 

Three  letters  :  October  26 39 

October  29      ...                ...  40 

November  2 4'.] 


VI  CONTENTS. 

VAGE 

Mr.  Ruskin  and  Professor  Hodgson.    1873. 

Two  letters  :  November  8 44 

November  15 46 

Strikes  t\  Arbitration.     1865 48 

Work  and  Wages.     1865. 

Five  letters  :  April  20 

April  22        --....- 

April  29  -        -        - 

May  4  ------- 

May  20    -------        - 

The  Standard  of  Wages.     1867 

How  the  Rich  spend  their  Money.     1873. 

Three  letters  :  January  23 

January  28 

January  30 

Commercial  Morality.     1875    ------ 

The  Definition  of  Wealth.     1875         ---.'.. 

The  Principles  of  Property.     1877 

On  Co- operation.     1879-80. 

Two  letters  :  August,  1879 73 

April  12,  1880 73 

Miscellaneous  Letteks. 
I.  The  Management  op  Railways. 

Is  England  Big  Enough?    1868        - 79 

The  Ownership  of  Railways.     1868    -.--.-      81 
Railway  Economy.    1868 83 


CONTENTS.  Vii 

PAGE 

Our  Railway  System.     1865 88 

Railway  Safety.     1870 89 


II.  Servants  and  Houses. 

Domestic  Servants— Mastership.     1865 93 

Domestic  Servants — Experieuce.     1865   -----  95 

Domestic  Servants — Sonship  and  Slavery.     1865        -        -        -  90 

Modern  Houses.     1865 104 

III.  Roman  Inundations. 

A  King's  First  Duty.     1871 Ill 

A  Nation's  Defences.     1871 113 

The  Waters  of  Comfort.     1871 11.5 

The  Streams  of  Italy.     1871 116 

The  Streets  of  London.     1871 119 

IV.  Education  for  Rich  and  Poor. 

True  Education.     1868 '123 

The  Value  of  Lectures.     1874 124 

The  Cradle  of  Art!     1876 125 

St.  George's  Museum.     1875 126 

The  Morality  of  Field  Sports.     1870 127 

Drunkenness  and  Crime.     1871 -  129 

Madness  and  Crime.     1872 130 

Employment  for  the  Destitute  Poor  and  Criminal  Classes.    1808  131 
Notes  on  the  General  Principles  of  Employment  for  the  Destitute 

and  Criminal  Classes  (a  Pamplilet).     1868  -        -        -        -  132 


Vm  CONTENTS. 

PAca| 

-<      '    Blindness  and  Sight.     1879         ".        .        I        .        -        -        .  139 

The  Eagle's  Nest.    1879  ..--.-.-  140 

Politics  in  Youth.     1879      - 141 

"Act,  Act  in  the  Living  Present."    1873        -        -        -        -  141 

"  Laborare  est  Orare."    1874 143 

A  Pagan  Message.     1878 143 

The  Foundations  of  Chivalry.  1877-8. 

Five  letters.  February  8,  1877  -        -        -        -        -        -  143 

February  10,  1877 145 

February  11,  1877 146 

February  12,  1877 147 

July  3,  1878 148 

V.  Women:  Their  Work  and  their  Dress. 

Woman's  Work.     1873 153 

Female  Franchise.     1870 154 

Proverbs  on  Right  Dress.     1862  -        -  - 154 

Sad-colored  Costumes.     1870           - 156 

Oak  Silkworms.     1862 _        -  158 

VI,  Literary  Criticism 

The  Publication  of  Books.     1875 163 

A  Mistaken  Review.     1875      -        - 165 

The  Position  of  Critics.     1875 167 

Coventry  Patmore's  '•  Faithful  for  Ever. "    1860             -        -  168 

"  The  Queen  of  the  Air. "    1871 171 

The  Animals  of  Scripture ;  a  Review,     1856  ....  172 


CONTEXTS.  IX 

PAOE 

"Limner"  and  Illumination.     1854 174 

Notes  on  a  "Word  in  Shakespeare.     1878. 

Two  letters :  September 170 

September  29 177 

"TheMerchant  of  Venice."    1880 179 

Recitations.    1880 -  186 

Appendix. 

Letter  to  W.  C.  Bennett,  LL.D.     1852 183 

Letter  to  Thomas  Guthrie,  D.D.     1853 184 

The  Sale  of  Mr.  Windus'  Pictures.     1859 185 

At  the  Play.     1867    -        - 185 

An  Object  of  Charity.     1868       -------  186 

Excuses  from  Correspondence.     1868      -----  186 

Letter-to  the  Author  of  a  Review.     1872    -----  187 

An  Oxford  Protest.     1874 188 

Mr.  Ruskin  and  Mr.  Lowe.     1877 189 

The  Bibliography  of  Ruskin.     1878. 

Two  letters :  September  30 190 

October  23 190 

The  Society  of  the  Rose.     1879        -----  191 


Letter  to  W.  H.  Harrison.     1865 192 

Dramatic  Reform.     1880.     (Two  letters)  -        -        -        -        193 

The  Lord  Rectorship  of  Glasgow  University.     1880.    (Five  letters)  195 

Epilogue 201 

Chiionologic-\l  List  of  the  Letters  contained  in  Both  Volumes      204 
Ln-dex 213 


NOTE  TO  THE  SECOND  VOLUTVIE. 

The  letters  relating  to  Mr.  Raakliis  candidature  for  the  Ijord  Rectorship  of 
Glasgoic  Unicemtifi/  were  published  when  this  volume  was  almost  out  of  the 
printers'  h</.nds.  TJwy  have  however  been  included,  by  Mr.  Buskin's  wish,  and 
will  be  found  at  tlie  end  of  this  volume,  where  a  letter  to  the  late  Mr.  W.  II. 
Harrison,  which  has  just  been  brought  to  my  notice,  and  two  very  recent  letters 
on  Dramatic  Reform,  have,  at  the  cost  of  some  delay,  been  also  added. — [Ed.] 

November  15,  1880. 


CHKONOLOGICAL  LIST  OF  THE  LETTERS 

Note.— In  the  second  and  third  columns  the  bracketed  words  and  figures  are 

of  the 


Title  of  Letter, 


Where  Written. 


Letter  to  W.  C.  Bennett,  LL.D. 

Letter  to  Dr.  Guthrie 

Letter  to  W.  H.  Harrison 

"  Limner"  AND  Illumination     . 

The  Animals  of  Scripture:  a  Review 

The  Sale  op  Mr.  Wlndus'  Pictures  . 

The  Italian  Question 


Coventry  Patmore's  '  'Faithful  for  Ever 

Proverbs  on  Right  Dress  . 

Oak  Silkworms    . 

The  Depreciation  of  Gold 

The  Foreign  Policy  of  Englan 

The  Position  of  Denmark         .        .        .1 

The  Law  of  Supply  and  Demand 


Strikes  X).  Arbitration 
Work  and  Wages 


Domestic  Servants — Mastership 
"  "  Experience 

"  Sonship  AND  Slavery 

Modern  Houses  . 
Our  Railway  System  . 
The  Jamaica  Insurrection 
At  the  Play 

The  Standard  of  Wages    . 
An  Object  of  Charity 
True  Education  . 
Excuse  from  Correspondence 
Is  England  Big  Enough?     . 
The  Ownership  of  Railways 
Railway  Economy 
Employment  for  the  Destitute  Poor,  etc. 
Notes  on  the  Destitute  Classes,  etc 
The  Morality  of  Field  Sports 
Female  Franchise 
The  Franco-Prussian  War 


Sad-Colored  Costumes 
Railway  Safety  . 
A  King's  First  Duty  . 
A  Nation's  Defences  . 
The  Waters  of  Comfort 
The  Streams  of  Italy 
Woman's  Sphere  (extract) 
The  "  Queen  op  the  Air" 


Heme  Hill,  Dulwich. 
Edinburgh] 
Heme  Hill 
Denmark  Hill   . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill 
Berlin . 
Berlin . 
Schaffhausen 
Denmark  Hill     . 
Geneva 
Geneva        .  . 
Chamounix 
Zurich 

Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
[Denmark  Hill]  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  « 
[Denmark  Hill]  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
[Denmark  Hill]  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill,  S. 
Denmark  Hill,  S. 
Denmark  Hill,  S. 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill  , 
Denmark  Hill,  S.E. 
[Denmark  Hill]  . 
Denmark  Hill 

Denmark  Hill,  S.E. 
[Denmark  Hill,  S.E. 
Denmark  Hill,  S.E. 
Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill]  . 
Denmark  Hill     . 
Oxford 
Oxford 
[Oxford      . 
[Denmark  Hill]  . 


CONTAINED  IN   THE  SECOND  VOLUME. 

more  or  less  certainly  conjectured  ;  whilst  those  unbracketed gite  the  actual  dating 
letters. 


When  Written. 


Where  and  when  first  PrBUSHED. 


Paok. 


December  28ih,  1853 
SaUirday,26th[Xov.?]1853i 

1853]  . 
December  3.  1854]  . 
Jauuuiy,  1855]         .        .  I 
.March  28  [1859]       . 
June  6.  1859     . 
June  15  [1859] 
August  1,  1859 
[October  21.  1860]   . 
October  20th,  1862  . 
October  20th  [1862] 
October  2  [1863]      . 
October  25th,  1863  . 
July  6  [1864]    . 
October  26  [1864]    . 
October  29  [1864]    . 
November  2  [1864] . 
Easter  Monday,  1865 
Thursday,  April  20  [1865] 
Saturday,  April  22,  1865 
Saturday,  29th  April,  1865 
May  4  [1865]    . 
May  20,  1865    . 
September  2  [1865] . 
September  6  [1865] . 
September  16.  1865] 
October  16  [1865]    . 
December  7  [1865J  . 
December  19  [1865] 
February  28,  1867    . 
April  30,  1867  . 
January  21,  1868     . 
January  31.  1868 
2d  Februar^-.  1868  . 
July  30  [1868]  . 
August  5  [1868] 
August  9  [1868] 
December  24  [1868] 
Autumn.  1868] 
January  14  [1870]    . 
29lh  [May,  1870 
October'6  [1870 
October  7  [1870 
14th  October,  1870 
November  29,  1870 
January  10  [1871] 
January  19.  1871 
February  3  [1871 
February  3  [1871 
February  19,  1871] 
May  18,  1871 


"Testimonials  of  W.  C.  Bennett,"  1871       183 

"Memoir  of  Thomas  Guthrie,  D.D.,"  (1875)  184 

The  Autoqraphic  Mirruv,  Dec.  23,  1865    .     192 

The  Builder,  Dec.  9,  1854  .        .        .         .174 

The  Morning  Chronicle,  Jan.  20,  1855       .    172 

The  Times,  ^larch  29.  1859        .        .        .185 

The  Scots17^an,  July  20,  1859      ...       3 

July  23,  1859      ...       8 

Aug.  6,  1859       ...      13 

The  Critic,  Oct.  27,  1860    ....  168 

The  Monthly  Packet,  Nov.  1863         .        .    154 

The  Times,  Oct.  24,  1862  .        .        .        .    158 

The  Times,  Oct.  8,  1863     .        .        .        .  j  37 

The  Liverpool  Albion,  Nov.  2,  1863    .        .  i  15 

The  Morning  Post,  July  7,  1864         .         .  1  17 

The  Daily  Telegraph,   Oct.  28,  1864  .        .      39 

Oct.  31.  1864  .        .40 

Nov.  3,  1864  .        .     43 

The  Pall  Mall  GazetU,  April  18,  1865        .     48 

April  21,  1865         .      50 

April  25.  1865         .     52 

May  2.  1865    .        .     54 

May  9,  1865    .        .     59 

May  22,  1865  .        .      62 

The  Daily  Telegi-aph,  Sep'tember  5, 1865  .     93 

September  7,  1865  .      95 

September  18,  1865     96 

October  17,  1865    .    104 

December  8,  1865  .  i  88 

December  20.  1865    |  20 

The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  March  1,  1867       .  |185  • 

May  1.  1867    .        .  I  65 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  January  22.  1868     .186 

The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  January  31.  1868  .    123 

Circular  printed  bv  Mr.  Kuskin,  1868       .    186 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  July  31,  1868  .        .  j  79 

August  6,  1868       .     81 

August  10,  1868     .  '  83 

December  26,  1868     131 

Pamphlet  for  private  circulation.  1868     .    132 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  January  15,  1870     .    127 

Date  and  place  of  publication  unknown  .    154 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  Oct.  7,  1870    .        .  i  22 

Oct.  8,  1870    .        .  I  25 

Macmillaics  Magazine,  li^ov.  ISliO      .        .    156 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  Nov.  30,  1870  .        .  i  89 

January  12,  1871    .   Ill 

The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  Jan.  19,  1871  .  |113 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  Feb.  4,  1871    .        .    115 

Feb.  7.  1871    .        .    116 

Feb.  21,  1871  .        .    154  w. 

The  Asiatic,  'Sliw  23,  1871  .        .        .    171 


XIT 


CHKONOLOGICAL   LIST   OF  THE   LETTERS 


Title  of  Letter. 


Drunkenness  and  CRrME    . 
The  Streets  op  London 
]\[adness  and  Crime     .        .        .        . 
Letter  to  the  Author  of  a  Review 
'  •  Act,  Act  in  the  Living  Present"  . 
How  the  Rich  spend  their  Money   , 


Woman's  Work 

Mr.  Ruskin  and  Professor  Hodgson 


"  Laborare  est  Orare" 
The  Vallte  op  Lectures     . 
An  Oxford  Protest    . 
A  Mistaken  Review    . 
The  Position  op  Critics 
Commercial  ]Morality 
The  Publication  op  Books 
St.  George's  Museum  . 
The  Definition  op  Wealth 
The  Cradle  op  Art  !  . 
Modern  Warfare 
The  Foundations  of  Chivalry 


Mr.  Ruskin  and  Mr.  Lowe  . 

The  Principles  of  Property 

A  Pagan  Message 

Despair  (extract) 

The  Foundations  of  Chivalry 

I^OTEs  ON  A  Word  in  Shakespeare 

<  (  <(  (I 

The  Bibliography  op  Ruskin     . 

The  Society  op  the  Rose 

Blindness  and  Sight   . 

'•  The  Eagle's  Nest"   . 

On  Cooperation.     L    . 

Politics  in  Youth 

The  Merchant  of  Venice  (extract) 

Recitations.  .        .        .        .        , 

Excuse  from  Correspondence  . 

On  Cooperation.    II.  . 

The  Glasgow  Lord  Rectorship 


Dramatic  Reform.     I. 

The  Glasgow  Lord  Rectorship 

Dramatic  Reform.     IL 


Where  Written. 


Denmark  Hill 

[Denmark  Hill]  . 

Oxford 

Oxford 

Oxford 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

[Brantwood,  Coniston] 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

Oxford         '. 

Oxford 

Oxford 

Rome 

[Oxford 

Brantwood  . 

Brantwood  . 

[Heme  Hill 

Oxford 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

Oxford 

[Oxford]      . 

[Brantwood] 

Venice 

Venice 

Venice 

Venice 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

[Brantwood] 

Heme  Hill,  London,  S.E. 

[Oxford       . 

Malbam 

Brantwood  . 

Edinburgh  . 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

[Brantwood 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

Brantwood,  Coniston 

Sheffield      . 

[Heme  Hill,  S.E.] 

Sheffield      . 


brantwood,  Coniston 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
[Brantwood] 
[Brantwood] 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
Brantwood  . 
Rouen 
Amiens 


CONTAINED    IN   THE    SECOND    VOLUME. 


XV 


When  Written. 


[Ib72] 


December  9  [1871] 
December  27,  1^71 
November  2  [1872] 
Wednesduy,  Oct.  30 
Christmas  Eve.  '72  , 
.Tamiary  23  [1873]  . 
January  28  [1873]  . 
King  Charles  the  Mart} 

1873  . 
[.Mav.  1873]      . 
November  8.  1873   . 
November  15.  1873 . 
December,  1873 
26th  May.  1874 
October  29.  1874]     . 
January  10  [1875]    . 
January  18  [1875]    . 
February,  1875] 
June  6,  '1875     . 
[September,  1875]   . 
9th  November,  1875 
18th  February,  1876 
June,  1876 
Fel)ruary  8th,  1877  . 
February  10th  [1877 
nth  February  [1877' 
12th  February,  '77] 
Aun:ust  24  [1877]     . 
lOtii  October,  1877  . 
19th  December,  1877 
February,  1878] 
July  3d.'  1878  . 
[September,  1878]    . 
29th  September,  1878 
September  30,  1878  . 
October  23,  1878      . 
Early  in  1879] . 
18tirjuly,  1879 
August  i7th,  1879    . 
[August,  1879] 
October  19th,  1879  . 
6tii  February,  1880  . 
16th  February,  1880 
:March,  1880     . 
April  12th,  1880       . 
10th  June,  1880 
10th  June,  1880 
24th  June,  1880 
[July,  1880]     . 
July  30th,  1880 
28tli  September,  1880 
October  12th,  1880  . 


Where  and  when  first  Pubushed. 


The  Daily  Telegraph,  Dec.  11,  1871  . 
The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  Dec.  28.  1871 
Nov.  4,  1872  . 
\Lkerpool  Weekly  Albion ,  Nov.  9,  1872 
JNew  Year's  Address,  etc.,  1.S73 
\The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  Jan.  24,  1873 
Jan.  29.  1873  . 

Jan.  31,  1873  . 
VEsj)erance,  Genhe,  May  8,  1873 
The  Scotitman,  November  10,  1873    . 
November  18,  1873    . 
New  Year's  Address,  etc.,  1874  . 
TJie  Glasgow  Herald,  June  5,  1874    . 
The  Globe,  Oct.  29,  1874    .... 
The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  January  11,  ls75  . 
"  "  January  19.  1875    . 

Date  and  place  of  publication  unknown  . 
The  Wurlcl  June  9,  1875  .... 
Sheffield  Daily  Tdegmph,  Sept.  6,  1875  . 
llie  Monetary  Gazette,  Nov.  13,  1875 
Date  and  place  of  publication  unknown  . 
Frailer  8  Magazine,  July,  1876  . 
I  "The  Science  of  Life"  (second  edit.),  1878 
I  "  "  (first  edition),  1877 

,  . .  i  >  it  a  1  O'*''^ 

lot  I 


The  Standard,  August  28,  1877 
The  Socialist,  November,  1877  . 
New  Year's  Address,  etc.,  1878 
Th^  Times,  February  12,  1878  . 
"The  Science  of  Life" (second  edit.), 
New  Shakspere  Soc.  Trans.  1878-9  . 


1877 


1878 


"Bibliography  of  Dickens"  (advt.),  1880  . 

Report  of  Ruskin  Soc,  Manchester,  1880 
The  T.  M.  A.  Magazine,  Sept.,  1879 

October,  1879    . 
TU  Christiath  Life,  December  20.  1879     . 
The  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,  Nov.,  1879 
The  Theatre,  March,  1880 
Circular  printed  by  Mr.  R.  T.  "NVebling    . 
List  of  Mr.  Ruskiii's  Writings,  IMar.,  1880 
TJie  Daily  News,  June  19,  1880 
The  Glasgow  Herald,  Oct.  7,  1880     . 
"   •         "  Oct.  7,  1880      . 

Oct.  7,  1880      . 

Oct.  12, 1880  . 
Journal  of  Dramatic  Reform,  Nov.,  1880  . 
The  Glasgow  Herald,  Oct.  7,  1880  . 
Journal  of  Dramatic  Reform,   Nov.,  1880 


Paok. 

"i 

129 

119 

130 

187 

il41 

I  60 

67 

I  68 

153 
I  44 
'  46 

142 

124 

188 

165 

167 
■   70 

163 

126 
I  71 
,125 
I  29 

143 

145 

146 

147 

189 

;  71 

143 
jl24n. 
148 
176 
177 
190 
'190 
|191 
139 
140 
I  '3 
il41 
,179 
!l80 
186//. 
73 
|195 
195 
196 
196 
!l93 
|197 
.193 


LETTEES  ON  POLITICS  AND 
WAR. 


The  Italian  Question.     1859. 

(Three  letters:    June  6,  June  15,  udcI  August  1.) 

The  Foreign  Policy  of  England.    1863. 

The  Position  of  Denmark.    1864. 

The  Jamaica  Insurrection.     1865. 

The  Franco-Prussian  War.     1870. 
(Two  letters  :     October  6  and  7.) 

Modern  Warfare.     1876. 


AREOWS  OF  THE   CHACE. 


LETTERS  ON   POLITICS  AND  WAR. 

[From  "  The  Scotsman,"  July  20,  1S59.] 

THE  ITALIAN   QUESTION* 

Berlln,  June  6,  1859. 

I  HAVE  been  thinking  of  sending  a  few  lines  about  what  I 
liave  seen  of  Anstrians  and  Italians  ;  but  every  time  I  took  my 
pen  and  turned  from  my  own  work  about  clouds  and  leafage 
to  think  for  a  few  minutes  concerning  political  clouds  and 
thickets,  I  sank  into  a  state  of  amazement  which  reduced  me  to 
helpless  silence.  I  will  try  and  send  you  an  incoherent  line  to- 
day ;  for  the  smallest  endeavor  at  coherence  will  bring  me 
nto  that  atmosphere  of  astonishment  again,  in  which  I  find  no 
expression. 

You  northern  Protestant  people  are  always  overrating  the 
value  of  Protestantism  as  such.  Your  poetical  clergymen 
make  sentimental  tours  in  the  Yaudois  country,  as  if  there 
were  no  worthy  jDeople  in  the  Alps  but  the  Yaudois.  Did  the 
enlightened  Edinburgh  evangelicals  never  take  any  interest  in 
the  freedom  of  the  Swiss,  nor  hear  of  s.uch  people  as  Wink- 
eh-ied  or  Tell?  Not  but  that  there  is  some  chance  of  Tell 
disappearing  one  of  these  days  under  acutest  historical  investi- 

*  This  and  the  two  following  letters  deal,  it  will  be  seen,  with  "the 
Italian  question"  in  1859,  when  the  peace  of  Europe  was  disturbed  by  the 
combined  action  of  France  and  Sardinia  .against  Austria  in  the  cause  of 
Italian  independence.  Of  these  three  letters  the  first  was  written  two  days 
after  the  defeat  of  the  Austriansat  Magenta,  followed  by  the  entrance  into 
Milan  of  the  French,  and  the  second  a  few  days  before  the  similar  victory 
of  the  French  and  Sardinian  armies  at  Solferino. 


4  LETTERS  ON  POLITICS  AND  WAR.  [1859. 

gation.  Still,  he,  or  somebody  else,  verily  got  Switzerland  rid 
of  much  evil,  and  made  it  capable  of  much  good ;  and  if  you 
examine  the  influence  of  the  battles  of  Morgarten  and  Sempach 
on  European  history,  you  will  find  they  were  good  and  true 
pieces  of  God's  work.*  Do  people  suppose  they  were  done  by 
Protestants  ?  Switzerland  owes  all  that  she  is — all  that  she  is 
ever  likely  to  be — to  her  stout  and  stern  Eoman  Catholics, 
faithful  to  their  faith  to  this  day — they,  and  the  Tyrolese, 
about  the  truest  Eoman  Catholics  in  Christendom  and  certainly 
among  its  worthiest  people,  though  they  laid  your  Zuingh  and 
a  good  deal  of  ranting  Protestantism  which  Zuingli  in  vain 
tried  to  make  either  rational  or  charitable,  dead  together  on  the 
green  meadows  of  Cappel,  and  though  the  Tyrolese  marksmen 
at  this  moment  are  following  up  their  rifle  practice  to  good  pur- 
pose, and  with  good  will,  with  your  Yaudois  hearts  for  targets. 
The  amazement  atmosjDhere  keeps  floating  with  its  edges 
about  me,  though  I  write  on  as  fast  as  I  can  in  hopes  of  keep- 
ing out  of  it.  You  Scotch,  and  we  English ! !  to  keep  up  the 
miserable  hypocrisy  of  calling  ourselves  Protestants !  And 
here  have  been  two  of  the  most  powerful  protests  (sealed  with 
quite  as  much  blood  as  is  usually  needed  for  such  documents) 
that  ever  were  made  against  the  Papacy — one  in  184:8,t  and 

*  Few  readers  need  be  reminded  of  the  position  of  Tell  in  the  list  of 
Swiss  patriots  {pace  the  "acutest  historical  investigation,"  which  puts  him 
in  the  list  of  mythical  personages)  in  the  early  part  of  the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury; of  Arnold  von  Winkelried  who  met  the  heroic  death,  by  which  he 
secured  his  country's  freedom,  at  Sempach  in  1386;  or  of  Ulrich  Zuingli, 
the  Swiss  Protestant  leader  of  his  time,  who  fell  at  Cappel,  in  the  war  of 
the  Reformed  against  the  Romish  cantons,  in  1531.  At  the  battle  of  Mor- 
garten, in  1315,  twenty  thousand  Austrians  were  defeated  by  no  more  than 
thirteen  hundred  Swiss,  with  such  valor  that  the  name  of  the  victors' 
canton  was  thereupon  extended  to  the  whole  country,  thenceforth  called 
Switzerland. 

It  may  be  further  noted  that  Arnold  of  Sempach  is,  with  Leonidas, 
Curtius,  and  Sir  Richard  Greuville,  named  amongst  the  types  of  "the 
divinest  of  sacrifices,  that  of  the  patriot  for  his  country,"  in  Mr.  Ruskin"s 
Preface,  "Bibliotheca  Pastorum,"  Vol.  i.  p.  xxxiii. 

f  The  year  of  the  Lombard  insurrection,  when  Radetzky,  the  Austrian 
field-marshal,  defeated  the  insurgents  at  Custozza  near  Verona.  Radetzky 
died  in  1858. 


1859.]  THE    ITALIAN    QUESTION.  0 

one  now — twenty  thousand  men  or  thereabouts  lying,  at  this 
time  being,  in  the  form  of  torn  flesh  and  shattered  bones, 
among  the  rice  marshes  of  the  Novarrese,  and  not  one  jot  of 
our  precious  Protestant  blood  gone  to  the  signature.  Not  so 
much  as  one  noble  flush  of  it,  that  I  can  see,  on  our  clay  cheeks, 
besmirched,  as  they  are,  with  sweat  and  smoke ;  but  all  for 
gold,  and  out  of  chimneys.  Of  sweat  for  bread  that  perishes 
not,  or  of  the  old  Sinai  smoke  for  honor  of  God's  law,  and 
revelation  thereof — no  drop  nor  shadow.  Not  so  much  as  a 
coroner's  inquest  on  those  dead  bodies  in  the  rice  fields — dead 
men  who  must  have  been  murdered  by  somebody.  If  a 
drunken  man  falls  in  a  ditch,  you  will  have  your  Dogberry 
and  Verges  talk  over  him  by  way  of  doing  justice ;  but  your 
twenty  thousand — not  drunken,  hut  honest,  respectable,  well- 
meaning,  and  seiwiceable  men — are  made  rice  manure  of,  and 
you  think  it  is  all  right.  We  Protestants  indeed !  The  Italians 
are  Protestants,  and  in  a  measure  the  French — nay,  even  the 
Austrians  (at  all  events  those  conical-hatted  mountaineers), 
according  to  their  understanding  of  the  matter.  What  we  are, 
Moloch  or  Mammon,  or  the  Protestant  devil  made  up  of  both, 
perhaps  knows. 

Do  not  think  I  dislike  the  Austrians.  I  have  great  respect 
and  affection  for  them,  and  1  have  seen  more  of  them  in 
familiar  intercourse  than  most  Englishmen.  One  of  my  best 
friends  in  Venice  in  the  winter  of  1849-50  was  the  Artillery 
officer  who  had  directed  the  fire  on  the  side  of  Mestre  in  IS-iS. 
I  have  never  known  a  nobler  person.  Brave,  kind,  and  gay — 
as  gentle  as  a  lamb,  as  playful  as  a  kitten — knightly  in  cour- 
tesy and  in  all  tones  of  thought — ready  at  any  instant  to  lay 
down  his  life  for  his  country  or  his  Emperor.  He  was  by  no 
means  a  rare  instance  either  of  gentleness  or  of  virtue  among 
the  men  whom  the  Liberal  portion  of  our  English  press  repre- 
sent as  only  tyrants  and  barbarians.  Radetzky  hunself  was 
one  of  the  kindest  of  men — his  habitual  expression  was  one  of 
overflowing  honhonlmie^  or  of  fatherly  regard  for  the  welfare 
of  all  around  him.  All  who  knew  him  loved  him.  In  little 
things  his  kffidness  was  almost  ludicrous.    I  saw  him  at  Verona 


6  LETTERS    02n     POLITICS    AND    WAR.  [1859: 

run  out  of  his  own  supper-room  and  return  with  a  plate  of 
soup  in  his  hand,  the  waiters  (his  youngest  aides-de-camp)  not 
serving  his  lady  guests  fast  enough  to  please  him ;  yet  they 
were  nimble  enough,  as  I  knew  in  a  race  with  two  of  them 
among  the  fire-flies  by  the  Mincio,  only  the  evening  before. 
For  a  long  time  I  regarded  the  Austrians  as  the  only  protec- 
tion of  Italy  from  utter  dissolution  (such  as  that  which,  I  see 
to-day,  it  is  reported  that  the  Tuscan  army  has  fallen  into,  left 
for  five  weeks  to  itself),  and  I  should  have  looked  upon  them 
as  such  still,  if  the  Sardinian  Government  had  not  shown  itself 
fit  to  take  their  place.  And  the  moment  that  any  Italian 
Government  was  able  to  take  their  place,  the  Austrians  neces- 
sarily became  an  obstacle  to  Italian  progress,  for  all  their 
virtues  are  incomprehensible  to  the  Italians,  and  useless  to 
them.  Unselfish  individually,  the  Austrians  are  nationally 
entirely  selfish,  and  in  this  consists,  so  far  as  it  is  truly  alleged 
against  them,  their  barbarism.  These  men  of  whom  I  have 
been  speaking  would  have  given,  any  of  them,  life  and  fortune 
unhesitatingly  at  their  Emperor's  bidding,  but  their  magnan- 
imity was  precisely  that  of  the  Highlander  or  the  Indian, 
incognizant  of  any  principle  of  action  but  that  of  devotion  to 
his  chief  or  nation.  All  abstract  grounds  of  conscience,  all 
universal  and  human  hopes,  were  inconceivable  by  them. 
Such  men  are  at  present  capable  of  no  feeling  towards  Italy 
but  scorn ;  their  power  was  like  a  bituminous  cerecloth 
wrapping  her  corpse — it  saved  her  from  the  rottenness  of 
revolution ;  but  it  must  be  unwound,  if  the  time  has  come 
for  her  resurrection. 

I  do  not  know  if  that  time  has  come,  or  can  come.  Italy's 
true  oppression  is  all  her  own.  Spain  is  oppressed  by  the 
Spaniard,  not  by  the  Austrian.  Greece  needs  but  to  be  saved 
from  the  Greeks.  'No  Fi'ench  Emperor,  however  mighty  his 
arm  or  sound  his  faith,  can  give  Italy  freedom. 

"A  gift  of  that  which  is  not  to  be  given 
By  all  the  associate  powers  of  earth  and  heaven." 

But  the  time  is  come  at  least  to  bid  her  be  free,  if  she  has  the 


1859.]  THE   ITALIAN    QUESTION.  7 

power  of  freedom.  It  is  not  England,  certainly,  who  slionld 
forbid  her.  I  believe  that  is  what  it  will  come  to,  however — 
not  so  nnich  because  we  are  afraid  of  Xapoleon,  as  because  we 
are  jealous  of  him.  But  of  him  and  us  1  have  something  more 
to  say  than  there  is  time  for  to-night.  These  good,  stupid, 
alfectionate,  faithful  Germans,  too  (grand  fellows  under  arms; 
I  never  imagined  so  magnilicent  a  soldiery  as  15,000  of  them 
which  I  made  a  shift  to  see,  through  sand  clouds,  march  past 
the  Prince  Frederick  AVilliam^^'  on  Saturday  morning  last). 
But  to  hear  them  fretting  and  foaming  at  the  French  getting 
into  Milan  I — they  having  absolutely  no  other  idea  on  all  this 
complicated  business  than  that  French  are  lighting  Germans  I 
Wrong  or  right,  why  or  wherefore,  matters  not  a  jot  to  them. 
French  are  lighting  Germans — somehow,  somewhere,  for  some 
reason — and  beer  and  Yaterland  are  in  peril,  and  the  English 
in  fault,  as  we  are  assuredly,  but  not  on  that  side,  for  I  believe 
it  to  be  quite  true  which  a  French  friend,  high  in  position,  says 
in  a  letter  this  moruing — "  If  the  English  had  not  sympathized 
with  the  Austrians  there  would  have  been  no  Avar."  By  way 
of  keeping  up  the  character  of  incoherence  to  which  I  have 
vowed  myself,  I  may  tell  you  that  before  that  French  letter 
came,  I  received  another  from  a  very  sagacious  Scotch  friend 
(belonging,  as  I  suppose  most  Scotch  people  do,  to  the  class  of 
persons  who  call  themselves  "  religious"),  containing  this  mar- 
vellous enunciation  of  moral  principle,  to  be  acted  npon  in 
difficult  circumstances,  "  Mind  your  own  business."  It  is  a 
serviceable  principle  enough  for  men  of  the  world,  but  a  sur- 
prising one  in  the  mouth  of  a  person  who  professes  to  be  a 
Bible  obeyer.  For,  as  far  as  I  remember  the  tone  of  that 
obsolete  book,  "  our  ow^n"  is  precisely  the  last  business  which 
it  ever  tells  us  to  mind.  It  tells  us  often  to  mind  God's  busi- 
ness, often  to  mind  other  people's  business  ;  our  own,  in  any 
eager  or  earnest  way,  not  at  all.     ''  What  thy  hand  lindeth  to 

*  The  Prince  Frederick  William,  now  Emperor  of  Germany  (having 
succeeded  his  brother  Frederick  William  IV.  in  January,  1861),  was  at  the 
date  of  this  letter  Regent  of  Prussia,  and  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  Prus- 
sian forces. 


8  LETTERS   ON    POLITICS   AN"D   WAR.  [1859. 

do."  Yes ;  but  in  God's  fields,  not  ours.  One  can  imagine 
the  wiser  fisliermen  of  the  Galilean  lake  objecting  to  Peter  and 
Andrew  that  they  were  not  minding  their  business,  much  more 
the  commercial  friends  of  Levi  speaking  with  gentle  pity  of 
him  about  the  receij^t  of  Custom.  "  A  bad  man  of  business 
always — see  what  has  come  of  it — quite  mad  at  last." 

And  my  astonishing  friend  w^ent  on  to  say  that  this  was  to 
be  our  principle  of  action  "where  the  path  was  not  quite  clear" 
— as  if  any  path  ever  was  clear  till  you  got  to  the  end  of  it,  or 
saw  it  a  long  way  off ;  as  if  all  human  possibility  of  path  was 
not  among  clouds  and  brambles — often  cold,  always  thorny — 
misty  with  roses  occasionally,  or  dim  with  dew,  often  also  with 
shadow  of  Death — misty,  more  particularly  in  England  just 
now,  with  shadow  of  that  commercially  and  otherwise  voluable 
smoke  before  spoken  of. 

However,  if  the  path  is  not  to  be  seen,  it  may  be  felt,  or  at 
least  tumbled  off,  witjiout  any  particular  difficulty.  This  latter 
course  of  proceeding  is  our  probablest,  of  course. — But  I  can't 
write  any  more  to-night.  I  am,  etc., 

J.  EUSKIN. 

Note  to  p.  6.— The  lines  quoted  are  from  Wordsworth's  "Poems  dedi- 
cated to  National  Independence  and  Liberty,"  Part  II.,  Sonnet  i.  The 
second  line  should  read,  "By  all  the  blended  powers  of  earth  and  heaven." 


[From  "  The  Scotsman,"  July  23,  1859.] 
THE    ITALIAN    QUESTION 


Berlin,  June  15. 
You  would  have  had  this  second  letter  sooner,  had  I  not 
lost  myself,  after  despatching  the  first,  in  farther  consideration 
of  the  theory  of  Non-intervention,  or  minding  one's  own  busi- 
ness. What,  in  logical  terms,  is  the  theory?  If  one  sees  a 
costermongor  wringing  his  donkey's  tail,  is  it  proper  to  "inter- 
vene" ?  and  if  one  sees  an  Emperor  or  a  System  wringhig  a 
nation's  neck,  is  it  improper  to  intervene?     Or  is  the  Interven- 


1859. J  THE    ITALIAN    (QUESTION.  9 

tion  allowable  only- in  the  case  of  hides,  i\ot  of  souls?  for  even 
so,  I  think  you  might  iiiid  among  modern  Italians  many  quite 
as  deserving  of  intervention  as  the  donkey.  Or  is  interference 
allowable  when  one  person  does  one  wrong  to  another  person, 
but  not  when  two  pei*sons  do  two  wrongs  to  two,  or  three  to 
three,  or  a  multitude  to  a  multitude ;  and  is  there  any  algebraic 
work  on  these  square  and  cube  roots  of  morality  wherein  1 
may  lind  how  many  coadjutors  or  commissions  any  given[ 
crooked  requires  to  niake  it  straight  i  Or  is  it  a  geographical 
question;  and  may  one  advisably  interfere  at  Berwick  but  not 
at  Haddington  ?  Or  is  there  any  graduated  scale  of  interven- 
tion, practicable  according  to  the  longitude  ?  I  see  my  way  less 
clearly,  because  the  illustrations  of  the  theory  of  Non-Interven- 
tion are  as  obscure  as  its  statement.  The  French  are  at  present 
happy  and  prosperous;  content  with  their  ruler  and  them- 
selves ;  their  trade  increasing,  and  their  science  and  art  advanc- 
ing ;  their  feelings  towards  other  nations  becoming  every  day 
more  just.  Under  which  circumstances  we  English  non-inter- 
ventionalists  consider  it  our  duty  to  use  every  means  in  our 
])ower  of  making  the  ruler  suspected  by  the  nation,  and  the 
nation  unmanageable  by  the  ruler.  We  call  both  all  manner  of 
names  ;  exhaust  every  term  of  impertinence  and  every  method 
of  disturbance;  and  do  our  best,  in  indirect  and  underhand 
ways,  to  bring  about  revolution,  assassination,  or  any  other  close 
of  the  existing  system  likely  to  be  satisfactoiy  to  Royals  *  in 
general.  This  is  your  non-intervention  when  a  nation  is  pros- 
perous. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Italian  nation  is  unhappy  and 
unprosperous ;  its  trade  annihilated,  its  arts  and  sciences  retro- 
grade, its  nerve  and  moral  sense  prostrated  together;  it  is 
capable  only  of  calling  to  you  for  help,  and  you  will  not  help 
it.  The  man  you  have  been  calling  names,  with  his  unruly 
colonels,  undertakes  to  help  it,  and  Christian  England,  with 
secret  hope  that,  in  order  to  satisfy  her  spite  against  the  unruly 
colonels,  the  French  army  may  be  beaten,  and  the  Papacy  fully 

*  A  misprint  for  "  Rogues."    See  ne.M  letter,  p.  13. 


10  LETTERS   ON   POLITICS   AND   WAR.  [1859. 

establislied  over  tlie  whole  of  Italy — Christian  EnglaDd,  I  say, 
with  this  spiteful  jealousy  for  one  of  her  motives,  and  a  dim, 
stupid,  short-sighted,  sluggisli  horror  of  interruption  of  business 
for  the  other,  takes,  declaratively  and  ostensibly,  this  highly 
Christian  position.  "  Let  who  will  prosper  or  perish,  die  or 
live — let  what  will  be  declared  or  believed — let  whatsoever 
iniquity  be  done,  whatsoever  tyranny  be  triumphant,  how  many 
soever  of  faithful  or  fiery  soldiery  be  laid  in  new  embankments 
of  dead  bodies  along  those  old  embankments  of  Mincio  and 
Brenta;  yet  will  we  English  drive  our  looms,  cast  up  our 
accounts,  and  bet  on  the  Derby,  in  peace  and  gladness ;  our 
business  is  only  therewith  ;  for  us  there  is  no  book  of  fate,  only 
ledgers  and  betting-books  ;  for  us  there  is  no  call  to  meddle  in 
far-away  business.  See  ye  to  it.  We  wash  our  hands  of  it  in 
that  sea-foam  of  ours ;  surely  the  English  Channel  is  better 
than  Abana  and  Pharpar,  or  than  the  silver  basin  which  Pilate 
made  use  of,  and  our  soap  is  of  the  best  almond-cake." 

I  hear  the  Derby  was  great  this  year.^  I  wonder,  some- 
times, whether  anybody  has  ever  calculated,  in  England,  how 
much  taxation  the  nation  pays  annually  for  the  maintenance 
of  that  great  national  institution.  Observe — what  I  say  of  the 
spirit  in  which  the  English  bear  themselves  at  present,  is 
founded  on  wdiat  I  myself  have  seen  and  heard,  not  on  what 
I  read  in  journals.  I  read  them  little  at  home — here  I  hardly 
see  them.  I  have  no  doubt  that  in  the  Liberal  papers  one 
might  find  much  mouthing  about  liberty,  as  in  the  Conserva- 
tive much  about  order,  it  being  neither  liberty  nor  order  which 
is  wanted,  but  Justice.  You  may  have  Freedom  of  all  Abomi- 
nation, and  Order  of  all  Iniquity — if  you  look  for  Forms  instead 
of  Facts.  Look  for  the  facts  first — the  doing  of  justice  howso- 
ever and  by  whatsoever  forms  or  informalities.  And  the  forms 
will  come — shapely  enough,  and  sightly  enough,  afterwards. 
Yet,  perhaps,  not  till  long  afterwards.  Earnest  as  I  am  for  the 
freedom  of  Italy,  no  one  can  hope  less  from  it,  for  many  a  year 

*  "Magnificent  weather  and  excellent  sport  made  the  great  people's 
meeting  pass  off  with  great  eclat."  ("Annual  Register"  for  1859,  p.  78.) 
The  race  was  won  by  Sir  J.  Hawley's  Musjid. 


1859.]  THE    ITALIAN    QUESTION.  11 

to  come.  Even  those  Yaudois,  whom  you  Presb}i;erians  admire 
80  much,  have  made  as  yet  no  great  show  of  fruit  out  of  their 
religious  freedom.  I  went  up  from  Turin  to  Turre  di  Lnceriui 
tu  look  at  them  last  year.  I  have  seldom  slept  in  a  dirtier  inn, 
seldom  seen  peasants'  cottages  so  ill  built,  and  never  yet  in  my 
life  saw  anywhere  paths  so  full  of  nettles.  The  faces  of  the 
people  are  interesting,  and  their  voices  sweet,  except  in  bowl- 
ings on  Sunday  evening,  which  they  performed  to  a  very  dis- 
quieting extent  in  the  street  till  about  half-past  ten,  waking  me 
afterwards  between  twelve  and  one  with  another  "  catch,"  and 
a  dance  through  the  village  of  the  liveliest  character.  Protes- 
tantism is  apt  sometimes  to  take  a  gayer  character  abroad  than 
with  us.  Geneva  has  an  especially  disreputable  look  on  Sun- 
day evenings,  and  at  Hanover  I  see  the  shops  are  as  wide  open 
on  Sunday  as  Saturday  ;  here,  however,  in  Berlin,  they  shut  up 
as  close  as  you  do  at  Edinburgh.  I  think  the  thing  that  an- 
noyed me  most  at  La  Tour,  however,  was  the  intense  sectarian- 
ism of  the  Protestant  dogs.  I  can  make  friends  generally,  fast 
enough,  with  any  canine  or  feline  creature ;  but  I  could  make 
nothing  of  those  evangelical  brutes,  and  there  was  as  much 
snarling  and  yelping  that  afternoon  before  I  got  past  the  farm- 
houses to  the  open  hill-side,  as  in  any  of  your  Free  Church 
discussions.  It  contrasted  very  painfully  with  the  behavior  of 
such  Roman  Catholic  dogs  as  I  happen  to  know — St.  Bernard's 
and  others — who  make  it  their  business  to  entertain  strangers. 
But  the  hill-side  was  worth  reaching — for  though  that  Lucerna 
valley  is  one  of  the  least  interesting  I  ever  saw  in  the  Alps, 
there  is  a  craggy  ridge  on  the  north  of  it  which  commands  a 
notable  view.  In  about  an  hour  and  a  half's  walking  you  may 
get  up  to  the  top  of  a  green,  saddle-shaped  hill,  which  separates 
the  Lucerna  valley  from  that  of  Angrogna ;  if  then,  turning  to 
the  left  (westward),  you  take  the  steepest  way  you  can  find  up 
the  hill,  another  couple  of  hours  will  bring  you  to  a  cone  of 
stones  which  the  shepherds  have  built  on  the  ridge,  and  there 
you  may  see  all  the  historical  sites  of  the  valley  of  Angrogna 
as  in  a  map — and  as  much  of  Monte  Yiso  and  Piedmont  as 
clouds  will  let  you.     I  wish  I  could  draw  you  a  map  of  Pied- 


12  LETTERS   ON    POLITICS   AND    WAR.  [1859. 

mont  as  I  saw  it  that  afternoon.  The  air  was  half  full  of  white 
cumulus  clouds,  lying  nearly  level  about  fifteen  hundred  feet 
under  the  ridge ;  and  through  every  gap  of  them  a  piece  of 
Piedmont  with  a  city  or  two.  Turin,  twenty-eight  miles  away 
as  the  bird  flies,  shows  through  one  cloud-opening  like  a  hand- 
ful of  golden  sand  in  a  pool  of  blue  sea. 

I've  no  time  to  write  any  more  to-day,  for  I've  been  to 
Charlottenburg,  out  of  love  for  Queen  Louise.  "^  I  can't  see  a 
good  painting  of  her  anywhere,  and  they  show  her  tomb  by 
blue  light,  like  the  nun  scene  in  Robert  le  Diable.  A  German 
woman's  face,  if  beautiful  at  all,  is  exquisitely  beautiful ;  but 
it  depends  mainly  on  the  thoughtfulness  of  the  eyes,  and  the 
bright  hair.  It  rarely  depends  much  upon  the  nose,  which 
has  perhaps  a  tendency  to  be — if  anything — a  little  too  broad- 
ish  and  flattish— perhaps  one  might  even  say  in  some  cases, 
knobbish.  (The  Hartz  mountains,  I  see,  looking  at  them  from 
Brunswick,  have  similar  tendencies,  less  excusably  and  more 
decidedly.)  So  when  the  eyes  are  closed — and  for  the  soft 
hair  one  has  only  furrowed  marble — and  the  nose  to  its  natural 
disadvantages  adds  that  of  being  seen  under  blue  light,  the 
general  effect  is  disappointing. 

Frederick  the  Great's  celebrated  statue  is  at  the  least  ten 
yards  too  high  f  from  the  ground  to  be  of  any  use  ;  one  sees 
nothing  but  the  edges  of  the  cloak  he  never  wore,  the  soles  of 
his  boots,  and,  in  a  redundant  manner,  his  horse's  tail.     Under 

*  The  mother  of  the  present  Emperor,  whose  treatment  by  Napoleon  I., 
and  whose  own  admirable  qualities,  have  won  for  her  the  tender  and  affec- 
tionate memory  of  her  people.  She  died  in  1810.  Her  tomb  at  Charlot- 
tenburg is  the  work  of  the  German  sculptor.  Christian  Ranch. 

f  The  full  height  of  this  statue  (also  the  work  of  Ranch)  is,  inclusive  of 
the  pedestal  somewhat  over  forty-tw^o  feet  from  the  ground.  One  of  the 
bas-relief  tablets  which  flank  the  pedestal  represents  the  Apotheosis  of  the 
monarch.  The  visitor  to  Berlin  may  recall  August  Kiss's  bronze  group, 
representing  the  combat  of  an  Amazon  with  a  tiger,  on  the  right  side  of 
the  Old  Museum  steps;  and  Holbein's  portrait  of  George  Gyzen,  a  mer- 
chant of  London,  is  No.  586  in  the  picture  galleries  of  the  Museum.  It  is 
described  by  Mr.  Ruskin  in  his  article  on  "Sir  Joshua  and  Holbein"  in  the 
CornMll  Maf/azine  of  March,  1860,  and  also  in  Wornum's  "Life  and  Works 
of  Holbein,''  p.  260  (London,  1867). 


1859.]  THE    ITALIAN    QUESTION.  13 

which  vertically  is  liis  Apotheosis.  In  wliidi  process  he  sits 
upon  tlie  back  of  an  eagle,  and  waves  a  pahn,  with  appearance 
of  satisfaction  to  himself,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  no  danger  of 
any  damage  to  three  stars -in  the  neighborhood. 

Kiss's  Amazon,  make^  a  good  grotesque  for  the  side  of  the 
Musemn  steps ;  it  was  seen  to  disadvantage  in  London.  The 
interior  of  the  gallery  is  very  beautiful  in  many  ways ;  and 
Holbein's  portrait  of  'George  Gyzen  is  worth  coming  all  the 
way  from  England  to  see  only  ten  minutes.  I  never  saw  so 
nuble  a  piece  of  work  of  its  kind  in  my  life. 

Believe  me,  etc., 

J.  RCSKIN. 


[From  "The Scotsman,*'  August  6, 1859.] 

THE  ITALIAN  QUESTION. 

ScHAFFHAUSKN,  Aiigust  1,  1859. 
Letter  to  the  Editor  {of  "  The  Scotsman"). 

Sir:  I  have  just  received  the  number  of  the  Scotsman 
containing  my  second  letter  from  Berlin,  in  which  there  is 
rather  an  awkward  misprint  of  "royals"  for  "rogues,"  which 
must  have  puzzled  some  of  your  readers,  no  less  than  the 
general  tone  of  the  letter,  written  as  it  was  for  publication  at 
another  time,  and  as  one  of  a  series  begun  in  another  journal. 
I  am  obliged  by  the  admission  of  the  letter  into  your  columns  ; 
and  I  should  have  been  glad  to  continue  in  those  columns  the 
series  I  intended,  had  not  the  refusal  of  this  letter  by  the 
Witness'^  shown  me  the  liability  to  misapprehension  under 

*  After  a  careful  and  repeated  search  iu  the  columns  of  the  Witness,  I 
am  still  unable  to  certainly  exphiin  these  allusions.  It  seems,  however, 
that  the  two  preceding  letters  had  been  sent  to  the  Witness^,  which  printed 
the  first  and  refused  to  print  the  second.  The  Scotsman  printed  both  under 
the  titles  of  "Mr,  Ruskin  on  the  Italian  Question,"  and  "^Ir.  Ruskin  on 
Foreign  Politics,"  whilst  it  distinguished  this  third  letter  by  the  additional 
heading  of  "Letter  to  the  Editor."    It  may  be  conjecturi-d.  therefore,  that 


14  LETTERS   OK   POLITICS   AKD   WAR.  [1859. 

which  I  should  be  writing.  I  had  thought  that,  seeing  for 
these  twenty  years  I  have  been  more  or  less  conversant  with 
Italy  and  the  Italians,  a  few  familiar  letters  written  to  a  per- 
sonal friend,  at  snch  times  as  I  could  win  from  my  own  work, 
might  not  have  been  uninteresting  to  Scottish  readers,  even 
though  my  opinions  might  occasionally  differ  sharply  from 
theirs,  or  be  expressed  in  such  rough  way  as  strong  opinions 
nmst  be,  when  one  has  no  time  to  polish  them  into  more  pleas- 
ing presentability.  The  refusal  of  the  letter  by  the  Wit7iess 
showed  me  that  this  was  not  so ;  and  as  I  have  no  leisure  to 
take  up  the  subject  methodically,  I  must  leave  what  I  have 
written  in  its  present  imperfect  form.  It  is  indeed  not  mainly 
a  question  of  time,  which  I  would  spend  gladly,  though  to 
liandle  the  subject  of  the  present  state  of  Italy  with  any  com- 
pleteness would  involve  a  total  abandonment  of  other  work  for 
some  weeks.  But  I  feel  too  deeply  in  this  matter  to  allow 
myself  to  think  of  it  continuously.  To  me,  the  state  of  the 
modern  jDolitical  mind,  which  hangs  the  slaughter  of  twenty 
thousand  men,  and  the  destinies  of  twenty  myriads  of  human 
souls,  on  the  trick  that  transforms  a  Ministry,  or  the  chances 
of  an  enlarged  or  diminished  interest  in  trade,  is  something  so 
horrible  that  I  find  no  utterance  wherewith  to  characterize  it — 
nor  any  courage  wherewith  to  face  the  continued  thought  of 
it,  unless  I  had  clear  expectation  of  doing  good  by  the  effort — 
expectation  which  the  mere  existence  of  the  fact  forbids.  I 
leave  therefore  the  words  1  have  written  to  such  work  as  they 
may ;  hoping,  indeed,  nothing  from  any  words ;  thankful  if  a 
few  people  here  and  there  understand  and  sympatliize  in  the 
feelings  with  which  they  were  written ;  and  thankful,  if  none 
so  sympathize,  that  I  am  abb  at  least  to  claim  some  share  in 


tlie  first  two  letters  were  reprinted  by  the  Scotsman  from  another  paper, 
and  that,  in  receiving  the  number  of  the  Scotsman  containing  the  second, 
Mr.  Raskin  did  not  know  that  it  had  reprinted  the  first  also.  As  to  the 
"series  begun  m  another  journal,"  it  is,  I  think,  clear  that  it  had  not  been 
long  continued,  as  the  letter  dated  "June  15,"  sent  to  and  refused  by  it,  is 
spoken  of  as  "the  second  letter,"  so  that  that  dated  "June  6"  must  have 
been  the  first,  as  this  was  unquestionably  the  last  of  the  series. 


I 


1863.]  THE   FOREIGN    POLICY    OF   ENGLAND.  15 

the  sadness,  though  not  in  the  triumph,  of  the  words  of  Fari- 
nata — 

"  Fu'  io  sol  cola,  dove  sofferto 

Fu  per  ciascun  di  torre  via  Fiorenza, 

Colui  che  la  difcse  a  vise  aperto."  * 

I  am,  etc.,  J.  Ruszm. 


[From  "The  Liverpool  Albion,"  November  2,  1863.] 

THE  FOREIGN  POLICY  OF  ENGLAND.\ 

Zurich,  Oct.  25th,  1863. 
Sir  :  I  beg  to  acknowledge  jour  favor  of  the  20th  of  Octo- 
ber. My  health  does  not  now  admit  of  my  taking  part  fre- 
quently in  public  business ;  yet  I  should  have  held  it  a  duty  to 
accept  the  invitation  of  the  directors  of  the  Liverpool  Institute, 
but  that,  for  the  time  being,  my  temper  is  at  fault,  as  well  as 
my  health ;  and  I  am  wholly  unable  to  go  on  with  any  of  my 
proper  work,  owing  to  the  horror  and  shame  with  which  I 
regard  the  political  position  taken,  or  rather  sunk  into,  by 

*  "  But  singly  there  I  stood,  when,  by  consent 
Of  all,  Florence  had  to  the  ground  been  razed. 
The  one  who  openly  forbade  the  deed." 

Gary's  Dante—"  L'Infemo,"  x.  11.  90-93. 

Farinata  degli  Uberti  was  a  noble  Florentine,  and  the  leader  of  the 
Ghibelline  faction,  when  they  obtained  a  signal  victory  over  the  Guelfi  at 
Montaperto,  near  the  river  Arbia.  Machiavelli  calls  him  "a  man  of  exalted 
soul,  and  great  military  talents"  (Hist,  of  Florence,  Bk.  ii.).  Subsequently, 
when  it  was  proposed  that,  in  order  to  maintain  the  ascendency  of  the 
Ghibelline  faction  in  Tuscany,  Florence  should  be  destroyed,  Farinata 
alone  of  all 'the  Council  opposed  the  measure,  declaring  that  he  had  endured 
every  hardship  with  no  other  view  than  that  of  being  able  to  pass  his  days 
in  liis  own  country.     (See  Gary's  notes  to  Canto  x.) 

t  This  letter  was  written  in  answer  to  a  request  that  Mr.  Ruskin  would 
come  and  preside  at  the  distribution  of  prizes  among  the  .'students  in  the 
Science  and  Art  Department  of  the  Liverpool  Institute,  on  Saturday,  Oct. 
31,  186:3.  It  was  subsequently  read  on  the  occasion  of  distribution,  in 
accordance  with  the  wish  expressed  towards  the  end  of  the  letter. 


16  LETTERS   OX    POLITICS   AND    WAR.  [1863. 

England  in  her  foreign  relations — especially  in  the  affairs  of 
Italy  and  Poland."  What  these  matters  have  to  do  with  Art 
may  not  at  first  be  clear,  bnt  I  can  perhaps  make  it  so  by  a  shoi-t 
similitude.  Suppose  I  had  been  engaged  by  an  English  gentle- 
man to  give  lectures  on  Art  to  his  son.  Matters  at  first  go 
smoothly,  and  I  am  diligent  in  my  definitions  of  line  and  color, 
until,  one  Sunday  morning,  at  breakfast  time,  a  ticket-of -leave 
man  takes  a  fancy  to  murder  a  girl  in  the  road  leading  round 
the  lawn,  before  the  house- windows.  My  patron,  hearing  the 
screams,  puts  down  his  paper,  adjusts  his  spectacles,  slowly 
apprehends  what  is  going  on,  and  rings  the  bell  for  his  smallest 
footman.  "  John,  take  my  card  and  compliments  to  that  gen- 
tleman outside  the  hedge,  and  tell  him  that  his  proceedings  are 
abnormal,  and,  I  may  add,  to  me  personally — offensive.  Had 
that  road  passed  through  my  property,  I  should  have  felt  it  my 
duty  to  interfere."  John  takes  the  card,  and  returns  with  it ; 
the  ticket-of -leave  man  finishes  his  work  at  his  leisure  ;  but,  tlie 
screams  ceasing  as  he  fills  the  girl's  mouth  with  clay,  the  Eng- 
lish gentleman  returns  to  his  muffins,  and  congratulates  him- 
self on  having  "  kept  out  of  that  mess.''  Presently  afterwards 
he  sends  for  me  to  know  if  I  shall  be  ready  to  lecture  on  Mon- 
day. I  am  somewhat  nervous,  and  answer — I  fear  rudely — 
"  Sir,  your  son  is  a  good  lad ;  I  hope  he  will  grow  to  be  a  man — 
but,  for  the  present,  I  cannot  teach  him  anything.  I  should 
like,  indeed,  to  teach  you  something,  but  have  no  words  for  the 
lesson."  Which  indeed  I  have  not.  If  I  say  any  words  on 
such  matters,  people  ask  me,  "  Would  I  have  the  country  go  to 
war  ?  do  I  know  how  dreadful  a  thing  war  is  ?"  Yes,  truly,  I 
know  it.  I  like  war  as  ill  as  most  people — so  ill,  that  I  would 
not  spend  twenty  millions  a  year  in  making  machines  for  it, 
neither  my  holidays  and  pocket  money  in  playing  at  it ;  yet  I 
would  have  the  country  go  to  war,  with  haste,  in  a  good  quar 
rel ;  and,  which  is  perhaps  eccentric  in  me,  rather  in  another's 
quarrel  than  in  her  own.  We  say  of  ourselves  complacently 
that  we  will  not  go  to  war  for  an  idea ;  but  the  phrase  inter- 

*  See  the  preceding  and  the  following  letter.     This  one  was,  it  will  be 
seen,  written  in  the  year  of  flio  last  great  struggle  of  Poland  against  Russia. 


1864.J  THE    POSITION   OF   DENMARK.  H 

preted  means  only,  that  we  will  go  to  war  for  a  bale  of  goods, 
but  not  for  justice  nor  for  mercy ;  ancf  I  would  ask  you  to 
favor  me  so  far  as  to  read  this  letter  to  the  students  at  your 
meeting,  and  say  to  them  that  I  heartilj^  wish  them  well ;  but 
for  the  present  I  am  too  sad  to  be  of  any  ser%^ice  to  them ;  that 
our  wars  in  China  and  Japan  *  are  not  likely  to  furnish  guotl 
subjects  for  historical  pictures  ;  that  "  ideas"  happen,  unfortu- 
nately, to  be,  in  Art,  the  principal  things;  and  that  a  country 
which  will  not  light  for  its  ideas  is  not  likely  to  have  anything 
worth  painting. 

I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

The  Secretary  of  the  Liverpool  Institute. 


[From  "  The  Morning  Post,"  July  7,  1864.1 

THE  POSITION   OF  DENMARK. 
To  the  Editor  of"  The  Morning  Postr 

Sir  :  Will  you  allow  me,  in  fewest  words,  to  say  how  deeply 
I  concur  in  all  that  is  said  in  that  noble  letter  of  Lord  Towns- 
hend's  published  in  your  columns  this  morning — except  only 
in  its  last  sentence,  "  It  is  time  to  protest."  f  Alas !  if  protests 
were  of  any  use,  men  with  hearts  and  lips  would  have  protested 

*  The  expedition  of  the  English  and  French  against  China  was  begun 
in  the  August  of  1860;  the  war  in  Japan  in  the  summer  of  1863. 

I  Lord  Townshend's  letter  was  upon  "The  Circassian  Exodus,"  and 
pointed  out  that  a  committee  appointed  in  1862  with  the  object  of  aiding 
the  tribes  of  the  Caucasus  against  Russia  had  failed  in  obtaining  subscrip- 
tions, whilst  that  of  1864,  for  relieving  the  sufferers  when  resistance  had 
become  impossible,  was  more  successful.  "  The  few  bestowed  their  sym- 
pathy upon  the  straggle  for  life;  the  many  reserved  theirs  for  the  agonies 

of  death To  which  side,   I  would  ask,   do  reason  and  justice 

incline?"  After  commenting  on  the  "tardy  consolation  for  an  evil  which 
we  have  neglected  to  avert,"  and  after  remarking  that  "in  the  national 
point  of  view  the  case  of  Poland  is  an  exact  counterpart  to  that  of  Circas- 
sia,"  the  letter  thus  concluded:  "  Against  such  a  state  of  things  it  is  surely 
time  for  all  who  feel  as  I  do  to  protest." 


18  LETTERS   ON    POLITICS   AND   WAR.  [1864. 

enough  by  this  time.  But  they  are  of  none,  and  can  be  of 
none.  What  true  words  are  worth  any  man's  utterance,  while 
it  is  possible  for  such  debates  as  last  Monday's  to  be,  and  two 
English  gentlemen  cau  stand  up  before  the  English  Commons 
to  quote  Yirgil  at  each  other,  and  round  sentences,  and  show 
their  fineness  of  wrist  in  their  pretty  little  venomous  carte  and 
tierce  of  personality,  while,  even  as  they  speak,  the  everlasting 
silence  is  wra japing  the  brave  massacred  Danes  ?  *  I  do  not 
know,  never  shall  know,  how  this  is  possible.  If  a  cannon  shot 
carried  off  their  usher's  head,  nay,  carried  off  but  his  rod's 
head,  at  tlieir  room  door,  they  would  not  roimd  their  sentences, 
I  fancy,  in  asking  where  the  shot  came  from ;  but  because 
these  infinite  masses  of  advancing  slaughter  are  a  few  hundred 
miles  distant  from  them,  they  can  speak  their  stage  speeches 
out  in  content.  Mr.  Gladstone  must  go  to  places,  it  seems, 
l)efore  he  can  feel!  Let  him  go  to  Alsen,  as  he  went  to 
Xaples,t  and  quote  Yirgil  to  the  Prussian  army.  The  English 
mind,  judging  by  your  leaders,  seems  divided  between  the 
German-cannon  nuisance  and  the  Savoyard  street-organ  nuis- 
ance ;  but  was  there  ever  hurdy-gurdy  like  this  dissonance  of 
eternal  talk  ?  ^     The  Savoyard  at  least  grinds  his  handle  one 

*  The  debate  (July  4, 1864)  was  upon  the  Danish  question  and  the  policy 
of  the  Government,  and  took  place  just  after  the  end  of  a  temporary  armis- 
tice and  the  resumption  of  hostilities  by  the  bombardment  of  Alsen,  in  the 
Dano-Prussian  war.  Alsen  was  taken  two  days  after  the  publication  of 
this  letter.  The  "two  English  gentlemen"  were  Mr.  Disraeli  and  Mr. 
Gladstone  (at  this  time  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer),  the  latter  of  whom 
had  quoted  the  lines  from. the  sixth  ^Eneid  (11.  489-491): 

"  At  Danaum  proceres  Agamennoniseque  phalanges 
Ut  videre  virum  f  ulgentiaque  arma  per  umbras 
Ingenti  tripedare  metu." 

f  In  1850,  when,  being  at  Naples,  Mr.  Gladstone  interested  himself 
deeply  in  the  cause  and  miserable  condition  of  the  political  prisoners,  and 
subsequently  addressed  two  letters  on  the  subject  to  Lord  Aberdeen  (see 
"  Letters  to  Lord  Aberdeen  on  the  prisoners  of  the  Neapolitan  Govern- 
ment:" Murray,  1851). 

.  X  The  Mornim/  Post  of  July  6  contained  amongst  its  leaders  one  on  Den- 
mark and  Germany,  and  another  on  London  street-organs,  the  nuisance  of 
which  had  been  recently  brought  before  the  House  of  Commons  by  Mr.  M. 
T.  Bass  (M.P.  for  Derby). 


1864.]  THE    POSITION    OF    DENMARK.  19 

way,  but  these  classical  discords  on  the  double  pipe,  like  Mr. 
Kinglake's  two  tunes — past  and  present^ — on  Savoy  and  Den- 
mark, need  stricter  police  interference,  it  seems  to  me !  The 
cession  of  Savoy  was  the  peaceful  present  of  a  few  crags,  goats, 
and  goatherds  by  one  king  to  another ;  it  was  also  fair  pay  for 
fair  work,  and,  in  the  profoundest  sense,  no  business  of  ours. 
Whereupon  Mr.  Kinglake  mewed  like  a  moonstruck  cat  going 
to  be  made  a  mummy  of  for  Bubastis.  But  we  saw  the  nol)le 
Circassian  nation  murdered,  and  never  uttered  word  for  them. 
We  saw^  the  noble  Polish  nation  sent  to  pine  in  ice,  and  never 
struck  blow  for  them.  !N'ow  the  nation  of  our  future  Queen 
calls  to  us  for  help  in  its  last  agony,  and  we  round  sentences 
and  turn  our  backs.  Sir,  I  have  no  words  for  these  things, 
because  I  have  no  hope.  It  is  not  these  squeaking  puppets 
who  play  before  us  whom  we  have  to  accuse ;  it  is  not  by  cut- 
ting the  strings  of  them  that  w^e  can  redeem  our  deadly  error. 
We  English,  as  a  nation,  know  not,  and  care  not  to  know, 
a  single  broad  oinBasic~principle  of  human  justice.  We  have 
only  our  Tnstmcfs"  to  guide  "ifsr  We  will  hit  anybody  again 
who  hits  us.  We  will  take  care  of  our  own  fandlies  and  our 
own  pockets ;  and  we  are  characterized  in  our  present  phase  of 
enlightenment  mainly  by  rage  in  speculation,  lavish  expendi- 
ture on  suspicion  or  panic,  generosity  whereon  generosity  is 
useless,  anxiety  for  the  souls  of  savages,  regardlessness  of  those 
of  civilized  nations,  enthusiasm  for  liberation  of  blacks,  apathy 
to  enslavement  of  whites,  proper  horror  of  regicide,  polite 
respect  fur  populicide,  sympathy  with  those  whom  we  can  no 
longer  serve,  and  reverence  for  the  dead,  wdiom  we  have  our- 
selves delivered  to  death. 

I  am.  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  KUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  July  6, 

*  Mr.  Alexander  William  Kinglake,  M.P.  for  Bridgewater.  He  spoke 
at  the  above-mentioned  debate,  and  had  also  taken  strong  interest  and  part 
in  the  cession  of  Savoy  to  France  by  Sardinia  in  1860. 


20  LETTERS  OK   POLITICS  AKD  WAB.  [1865. 

[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  December  20, 1865.] 

TEE  JAMAICA  IN8UBBEGTI0N.'' 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph," 

Sir  :  Will  you  allow  me,  in  tliis  informal  manner,  to  express 
what  I  should  have  wished  to  express  by  signature  of  tlie 
memorial  you  publish  to-day  from  Huddersfield  \  respecting 
tlie  Jamaica  insurrection,  and  to  thank  you  for  your  excellent 
article  of  the  15th  December  on  the  same  subject.  I  am  com- 
pelled to  make  this  request,  because  I  see  my  friend  Mr. 
Thomas  Hughes  has  been  abetting  the  Radical  movement 
against  Governor  Eyre ;  and  as  I  employed  what  little  influence 
I  have  with  the  London  workmen  to  aid  the  return  of  Mr. 
Hughes  for  Lambeth,  I  may  perhaps  be  thought  to  concur 
with  him  in  every  line  of  action  he  may  see  fit  subsequently 
to  adopt.  Permit  me,  then,  once  for  all,  through  your  widely- 
read  columns,  to  say  that  I  did  what  I  could  towards  the  return 
both  of  Mr.  J.  S.  Mill  and  of  Mr.  Hughes,:^  not  because  I  held 
with  them  in  all  their  opinions,  or  even  in  the  main  principle 
of  their  opinions,  but  because  I  knew  they  had  a  principle  of 
opinions;  that  they  were  honest,  thoughtful,  and  benevolent 
men ;  and  far  worthier  to  be  in  Parliament  (even  though  it 
might  be  in  opposition  to  many  causes  I  had  at  heart)  than 
any  other  candidates  I  knew.  They  are  my  opponents  in 
many  things,  though  I  thought  better  of  them  both  than  that 
they  would  countenance  this  fatuous  outcry  against  Governor 

*  The  outcry  against  Governor  Eyre  for  the  course  he  took  in  suppress- 
ing the  negro  insurrection  at  Morant  Bay,  Jamaica,  in  1865,  is  still  within 
the  memory  of  the  general  public.  Mr.  Ruskin  attended  and  spoke  at  the 
meetings  of  the  Eyre  Defence  Fund,  to  which  Mr.  Carlyle  (see  note  at  the 
end  of  this  letter)  gave  his  warm  support.  Amongst  those  who  most 
strongly  deprecated  the  course  taken  by  Governor  Eyre  were,  as  this  letter 
implies,  Mr.  John  Stuart  Mill  (Chairman  of  the  Jamaica  Committee)  and 
Mr.  Thomas  Hughes. 

f  Signed  by  273  persons  resident  in  and  near  Huddersfield.  {Daily  Tele- 
graph, December  19,  1865.) 

X  Mr.  Mill  had  been  recently  returned  for  Westminster,  and  Mr.  Hughes 
for  Lambeth. 


1865. J  THE    JAMAICA    1NSURRECTI0^^  21 

Eyre.  But  in  most  directions  of  thought  and  action  they  are 
for  Liberty,  and  I  am  for  Lordship ;  they  are  Molj's  men  and 
I  am  a  King's  man.  Yes,  sir,  I  am  one  of  those  ahnost  for- 
gotten creatures  who  shrivel  under  your  daily  scorn ;  I  am  a 
"Conservative,"  and  hope  forever  to  be  a  Conservative  in  tJie 
deepest  sense — a  Re-former,  not  a  De-former.  Xot  that  T  like 
slavery,  or  object  to  the  emancipation  of  any  kind  or  number 
of  blacks  in  due  place  and  time.  But  I  understand  something 
more  by  "  slavery"  than  either  Mr.  J.  S.  Mill  or  Mr.  Hughes ; 
and  believe  that  white  emancipation  not  only  ought  to  precede, 
but  nnist  by  law  of  all  fate  precede,  black  emancipation.  I 
much  dislike  the  slavery,  to  man,  of  an  African  laborer,  with 
a  spade  on  his  shoulder ;  but  I  more  dislike  the  slavery,  to  the 
devil,  of  a  Calabrian  robber  with  a  gun  on  his  shoulder.  I  dis- 
like the  American  serf-economy,  whicli  separates,  occasionally, 
man  and  wife:  but  I  more  dislike  the  Eno-lish  serf-economv, 
which  prevents  men  from  being  able  to  have  wives  at  all.  I 
dislike  the  slavery  which  obliges  women  (if  it  does)  to  carry 
their  children  over  frozen  rivers ;  but  I  more  dislike  the  slavery 
which  makes  them  throw  their  children  into  wells.  I  would 
willingly  hinder  the  selling  of  girls  on  the  Gold  Coast;  but 
primarily,  if  I  might,  would  hinder  the  selling  of  them  in 
Mayfair.  And,  finally,  while  I  regret  the  need  that  may  exist 
amono;  savas^es  in  a  distant  island  for  their  crovernor  to  do  his 
work  sharply  and  suddenly  on  them,  I  far  more  regret  the 
need  among  men  of  race  and  capacity  for  the  work  of  governois 
when  they  have  no  governor  to  give  it  them.  Of  all  dishoimi-- 
able  and  impious  captivities  of  this  age,  the  darkest  was  that 
of  England  to  Bussia,  by  which  she  was  compelled  to  refuse  to 
give  Greece  a  King  when  Greece  besought  one  from  her,  and 
to  permit  that  there  should  be  set  on  the  Acropolis  throne  no 
Governor  Eyre,  nor  anything  like  him,  but  such  a  shadow  of 
King  as  the  black  fates  cast  upon  a  nation  for  a  curse,  saying, 
"  Woe  to  thee,  O  land,  when  thy  king  is  a  child !"  * 

*  The  present  king  of  Greece  was  only  eighteen  years  of  age  when, 
after  the  protocol  of  England,  Kussia,  and  France  on  the  preceding  day, 
he  accepted,  June  6,  1863,  the  crown  of  Greece. 


32  LETTERS   ON   POLITICS   AIS'D  WAK.  [1870. 

Let  the  men  who  would  now  deserve  well  of  England 
reserve  their  impeachments,  or  turn  them  from  those  among 
us  who  have  saved  colonies  to  those  who  have  destroyed 
nations. 

I  am,  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

J.  KUSKIN.* 

Denmark  Hill,  Dec.  19. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  October  7,  .1870.] 

TEE  FRANCO-PRUSSIAN  WAR. 

To  the  Editm-  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph. " 

Sib  :  My  friends  ask  me  why  I  speak  no  word  about  this 
war,  supposing — like  vain  friends  as  they  are — that  I  might 
have  some  poor  influence  of  intercession  for  filigree-work, 
French  clocks,  and  other  tender  articles  of  vertii,  felt  at  this 
moment  to  be  in  grave  danger. 

But,  in  the  first  place,  I  know  that  the  just  Fates  will 
reward  no  intercession,  either  for  human  life  or  chinaware, 
until  their  will  has  been  accomplished  upon  all  of  us.  In  the 
second,  I  know  also  that  the  German  armies  will  spare  what 
they  can,  and  think  they  ought,  without  taking  advice  of  me. 
In  the  third,  I  have  said  long  ago — no  one  listening — the  best 
I  had  to  say  on  these  niatters. 

But,  after  your  notice  to-day  of  the  escape  of  M.  Edouard 

*  It  is  of  interest  to  remark  that  Mr.  Carlyle,  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Hamilton 
Hume,  Hon.  Sec.  of  the  "Eyre  Defence  Fund"  (published  in  the  Daily 
Telegraph  of  September  13,  1866),  expressed  himself  as  follows:  "The 
clamor  raised  against  Governor  Eyre  appears  to  me  to  be  disgraceful  to 
the  good  sense  of  England;  .  .  .  penalty  and  clamor  are  not  the  things 
this  Governor  merits  from  any  of  us,  but  honor  and  thanks,  and  wise 
imitation.  .  .  .  The  whole  weight  of  my  conviction  and  good  wishes 
is  with  you."  Mr.  Carlyle  was,  with  Sir  Roderick  Murchison,  one  of  the 
two  vice-presidents  of  the  Defence  Committee.  (See  "The  History  of  the 
Jamaica  Case,"  by  G.  W.  Finlason  :  London,  1869,  p.  369.) 


1870.]  THE   FRANCO-PRUSSIAN   WAR.  23 

Fivre,"^  whose  gentle  power  I  was,  I  believe,  the  first  to  recog- 
nize publicly  in  England,  it  is  possible  that  some  of  your 
i-eaders  may  care  to  look  back  at  what  I  wrote  of  modern  war 
four  years  ago,  and  to  know  the  aspect  it  takes  to  me,  now 
that  it  has  come  to  pass. 

If  you  will  reprint  these  few  following  sentences  for  me 
from  the  **  Crown  of  Wild  Olive,"  f  I  shall  be  able  to-morrow 
to  put  what  I  would  add  to  them  briefly  enough  to  claim 
little  space  in  your  columns : 

If  you  have  to  take  away  masses  of  men  from  all  industrial 
employment — to  feed  -them  by  the  labor  of  others — to  move 
them,  and  provide  them  with  destructive  machines,  varied  daily 
in  national  rivalship  of  inventive  cost ;  if  you  have  to  ravage 
the  country  which  you  attack — to  destroy,  for  a  score  of  future 
years,  its  roads,  its  woods,  its  cities,  and  its  harbors ;  and  if, 
finally,  ha-s^ing  brought  masses  of  men,  counted  by  hundreds  of 
thousands,  face  to  face,  you  tear  those  masses  to  pieces  with 
jagged  shot,  and  leave  fragments  of  living  creatures,  countlessly 
beyond  all  help  of  surgery,  to  starve  and  parch,  through  days  of 
torture,  down  into  clots  of  clay — what  book  of  accounts  shall 
record  the  cost  of  your  work — what  book  of  judgment  sentence 
the  guilt  of  it  ? 

That,  I  say,  is  modern  war — scientific  war — chemical  and 
mechanical  war — worse  even  than  the  savage's  poisoned  arrow. 
And  yet  you  will  tell  me,  perhaps,  that  any  other  war  than  this 

*  M.  Edouard  Frere  and  Mdlle.  Rosa  Bonlicur  were  allowed  to  leave 
Paris  and  pass  the  lines  of  tiie  Prussian  army  after  the  blockade  of  the 
French  capital  had  been  begun.  For  Mr.  Ruskiu's  early  recognition  of  M. 
Frere's  power,  see  the  "Academy  Notes,"  No.  II.  (ISoC),  p.  47,  where  some 
"cottage  studies"  are  spoken  of  as  "quite  unequalled  in  sincerity  and 
truth  of  conception,  though  somewhat  dimly  painted;" — No.  III.  (1857), 
p.  58,  where  his  pictures  are  said  to  "  unite  the  depth  of  Wordsworth,  the 
grace  of  Reynolds,  and  the  holiness  of  Angelico;" — and  No.  IV.  (1858),  p. 
33,  where  this  last  expression  of  praise  is  emphasized  and  at  some  length 
explained. 

f  See  for  the  first  two  paragraphs  of  extracts  following  pp.  170,  171  of 
the  original,  and  §§102-3  of  the  1873  edition  of  the  "Crown  of  Wild 
Olive;"  for  the  third  paragrapli,  pp.  116-118,  and  §  74;  and  for  the  last  two 
paragraphs,  pp.  186, 187,  and  5^  113,J14,  respectively,  of  those  two  editions. 


24  LETTERS   02^   POLITICS   AND   WAR.  [1870. 

is  impossible  now.  It  may  be  so ;  the  progress  of  science  can- 
not, perhaps,  be  otherwise  registered  than  by  new  facilities  of 
destruction;  and  the  brotherly  love  of  our  enlarging  Christianity 
be  only  proved  by  multiplication  of  murder. 

But  the  wonder  has  always  been  great  to  me  that  heroism 
has  never  been  supposed  consistent  with  the  practice  of  supply- 
ing people  with  food,  or  clothes,  but  only  with  that  of  quartering 
one's  self  upon  them  for  food,  and  stripping  them  of  their  clothes. 
Spoiling  of  armor  is  an  heroic  deed  in  all  ages  ;  but  the  selling 
of  clothes,  old  or  new,  has  never  takeu  any  color  of  magnanim- 
ity. Yet  one  does  not  see  why  feeding  the  hungry  and  clothing 
the  naked  should  ever  become  base  businesses  even  when  engaged 
in  on  a  large  scale.  If  one  could  contrive  to  attach  the  notion 
of  conquest  to  tliem  anyhow?  so  that,  supposing  there  were  any- 
where an  obstinate  race,  who  refused  to  be  comforted,  one  might 
take  some  pride  in  giving  them  compulsory  comfort,  and,  as  it 
were,  ^^  occupying  a  country"  w^ith  one's  gifts,  instead  of  one's 
armies  ?  If  one  could  only  consider  it  as  much  a  victory  to  get 
a  barren  field  sown  as  to  an  eared  field  stripped;  and  contend 
who  should  build  villages,  instead  of  who  should  ^^  carry"  them? 
Are  not  all  forms  of  heroism  conceivable  in  doing  these  service- 
able deeds  ?  You  doubt  who  is  strongest  ?  It  might  be  ascer- 
tained by  push  of  spade  as  well  as  push  of  sword.  Who  is 
wisest  ?  There  are  witty  things  to  be  thought  of  in  planning 
other  business  than  campaigns.  Who  is  bravest  ?  There  are 
always  the  elements  to  fight  with,  stronger  than  men  ;  and 
nearly  as  merciless. 

And,  then,  observe  farther,  this  true  power,  the  power  of 
saving,  depends  neither  on  multitude  of  men,  nor  on  extent  of 
territory.  We  are  continually  assuming  that  nations  become 
strong  according  to  their  numbers.  They  indeed  become  so,  if 
those  numbers  can  be  made  of  one  mind.  But  how  are  you  sure 
you  can  stay  them  in  one  mind,  and  keep  them  from  having 
north  and  south  minds  ?  Grant  them  unanimous,  how  know 
you  they  will  be  unanimous  in  right  ?  If  they  are  unanimous 
in  wrong,  the  more  they  are,  essentially  the  weaker  they  are. 
Or,  suppose  that  they  can  neither  be  of  one  mind,  nor  of  two 
minds,  but  can  only  be  of  no  mind?  Suppose  they  are  a  mere 
helpless  mob,    tottering    into    precipitant   catastrophe,   like  a 


1870.]  THE   FRANCO-PRUSSIAN    WAR.  26 

wagon-load  of  stones  when  the  wheel  comes  off  ?     Dangerous 
enough  for  their  neighbors  certainly,  but  not  **  powerful.'' 

Neither  docs  strength  depend  on  extent  of  territory,  any 
more  than  upon  number  of  population.  Take  up  your  masses, 
])ut  the  cluster  of  the  British  Isles  beside  the  mass  of  South 
America,  and  then  consider  whether  any  race  of  men  need  con- 
sider how  much  gi-ound  they  stand  upon.  The  strength  is  in 
the  men,  and  in  their  unity  and  virtue,  not  in  their  standing- 
room.  A  little  group  of  wise  hearts  is  better  than  a  wilderness 
full  of  fools  ;  and  only  that  nation  gains  true  territory  which 
gains  itself. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.   KUSKIN. 
Denmark  Hill,  S.E,,  Oct.  6. 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  Octobers,  1870.] 

THE  FRANCO-PRUSSIAN   WAR. 

To  the  Editor  o/  "  The  DaUy  Telegraph.'' 

Sir  :  As  I  am  always  blamed  if  I  approach  my  subject  on 
any  but  its  picturesque  side,  it  is  well  for  me  that  in  to-day's 
Times  I  find  it  announced  that  at  Strasburg  the  Picture  Gal- 
lery— with  the  pictures  in  it? — the  Library — with  the  books 
in  it  ? — and  the  Theatre,  with  certainly  two  hundred  persons 
in  it,  have  been  burnt  to  the  ground  under  an  auxiliary  can- 
nonade, the  flames  at  night  being  '*  a  tempting  target."  It  is 
true  that  in  your  columns  I  find  the  consolatory  news  that  the 
Parisians  are  repairing  those  losses  by  casting  a  bronze  Stras- 
burg;- but  if,  as  a  poor  art  "professor,  I  may  venture  an 
opinion,  I  w'ould  fain  suggest  to  them  that  if  their  own  picture 
gallery,  with  the  pictures  and  bits  of  marble  in  it — Yenus  of 

*  The  Daily  Telegraph  of  Oct.  7  contained  amongst  its  Paris  news  tliat 
of  the  decision  of  the  Government  of  National  Defence  to  cast  a  statue  of 
the  city  of  Strasburg  in  bronze,  in  memory  of  its  "  heroic  resistance  to  the 
enemy  during  a  murderous  siege  of  fifty  days." 


26  LETTERS   OX   POLITICS   AN"D   WAR.  [1870. 

Melos  and  the  like — and  their  own  Library — Eoval,  Imperiale, 
Rationale,  or  whatever  they  now  call  it — should  presently 
become  tempting  targets  also  by  the  light  of  their  own  flames, 
the  casting  of  a  bronze  Paris,  in  even  the  most  imposing  of 
attitudes,  will  scarcely  redeem  their  loss,  were  it  but  to  the 
admiring  eyes  of  Paris  herself. 

There  is  yet  another  letter  in  the  Times,^  of  more  impor- 
tance than  the  one  from  Strasburg.  It  is  headed,  "  The 
Difficulties  of  IS'eutrality,"  dated  Bonn,  and  anticipates  part  of 
what  I  was  going  to  say ;  for  the  rest,  the  lessons  of  the  war, 
as  I  read  them,  are  briefly  these. 

As  to  its  cause,  neither  the  French  nation  nor  their  Empe- 
ror brought  on  war  by  any  present  will  of  their  own.  Is^either 
of  them  were  capable  of  a  will  at  all — far  less  of  executing  it. 
The  nation  has  since  declared,  by  submission,  with  acclaim,  to 
a  change  of  Government  which  for  the  time  renders  all  politi- 
cal treaty  with  it  practically  impossible,  that  during  the  last 
twenty  years  it  has  been  deceived  or  subdued  into  obedience 
to  a  man  for  whom  it  had  no  respect,  and  who  had  no  heredi- 
tary claim  to  the  throne.  What  "  will "  or  responsibility  of 
action  can  be  expected  from  a  nation  which  confesses  this  of 
itself  ?  On  the  other  hand,  the  Emperor,  be  his  motives  never 
so  selfish,  could  only  have  hoped  to  save  his  dynasty  by  com- 
pliance with  the  passions  of  a  populace  which  he  knew  would 
overthrow  it  in  the  first  hour  of  their  mortification.  It  is  in 
these  vain  passions  and  the  falsehoods  on  which  they  have  fed 
that  we  must  look  for  the  deep  roots  of  all  this  misery.  Since 
the  days  of  the  First  Empire,  no  cottage  in  France  has  been 
without  its  ISTapoleonic  picture  and  legend,  fostering  one  and 
the  same  faith  in  the  heart  of  every  peasant  boy,  that  there  is 

*  This  letter  M^as  signed  "  W.  C.  P.,"  who,  after  stating  himself  to  be  an 
English  resident  in  Germany,  proceeded  to  lament  the  changed  position  of 
England  in  the  opinion  of  foreign  nations,  and  especially  in  that  of  the 
Germans,  who  no  longer  spoke  of  her,  as  formerly,  "with  affectionate 
admiration  or  even  envious  respect."  "And  I  must  confess,"  concluded 
the  letter,  "that  I  find  it  difficult  to  answer  them;  for  it  seems  to  me  that 
we  have  already  good  reason  to  say,  in  reference  to  the  present  struggle, 
'  All  is  lost  save  money.' " — Times,  October  7,  1870. 


1870.]  THE   FRANCO-PRUSSIAN   WAR.  27 

no  glory  but  in  battle ;  and  since  the  founding  of  the  Second 
Empire  no  street  of  any  city  has  risen  into  its  foolish  niagniti- 
cence  without  collateral  proclamation  that  there  was  no  pleas- 
ure but  in  vice. 

Then,  secondly,  for  the  actual  question  of  the  war :  it  is  a 
simple  and  testing  struggle  between  pure  Republicanism  on 
the  one  side,  expressed  in  the  most  exquisite,  tinished,  and 
exenqjlary  anarchy,  yet  achieved  under — earth — and  one  of 
the  truest  Monarchies  and  schools  of  honor  and  obedience  yet 
organized  under  heaven.  And  the  secret  of  its  strength,  we 
have  to  note,  is  essentially  pacific ;  for  all  the  wars  of  the 
Great  Friedrich  would  have  passed  away  resultless — as  great 
wars  usually  do — had  it  not  been  for  this  pregnant  fact  at 
the  end  of  them:  "All  his  artillery  horses  are  parted  into 
plough-teams,  and  given  to  those  who  otherwise  can  get  none" 
(Carlyle,  vol.  vi.,  first  edition,  p.  350) — that  21st  book  on  the 
repair  of  Prussia  being  of  extant  literature  the  most  important 
piece  for  us  to  read  and  digest  in  these  days  of  '"  raising  the 
poor  without  gifts" — never  asking  who  first  let  them  fall — 
and  of  turning  workmen  out  of  dockyards,  without  any  con- 
sciousness that,  of  all  the  stores  in  the  yard,  the  men  were 
exactly  the  most  precious.  You  expressed,  Sir,  in  your  article 
on  the  loss  of  the  Captain,*  a  feeling  common,  I  suppose,  for 
once,  to  all  of  us,  that  the  principal  loss  was  not  the  iron  of 
the  ship,  but  the  ^ve  hundred  men  in  her.  Perhaps,  had  she 
been  of  gold  instead  of  iron  plate,  public  mourning  might 
have  inclined  itself  to  the  side  of  the  metal.  But  how  if  the 
whole  British  public  should  be  itself  at  this  instant  afloat  in  a 
captainless  Captain,  built  of  somewhat  dirty  yet  substantial 
gold,  and  in  extremest  peril  of  turning  bottom  upwards  I 
Which  will  be  the  end,  indeed,  unless  the  said  public  quickly 
perceive  that  their  hope  must  be,  not  in  docks  nor  ships,  but  in 
men.  They,  and  they  only,  are  our  guarantee  for  territory. 
Prussia  herself  seems  as  simple  as  the  rest  of  us  in  her  talk  of 

*  The  turret  ship  "  Captain"  foundered  off  Cape  Fiuistcrre  ou  Septem- 
ber 7,  1870.  For  the  articles  alluded  to,  see  the  Daily  Tdifjmph  of  Septem- 
ber 12  and  following  days. 


28  LETTEES   OJ?"   POLITICS   AKD   WAR.  [1870. 

'^  guarantees."  Alsace  and  Lorraine,  if  dishonestly  come  by, 
may  be  honestly  retaken ;  bnt  if  for  "  guarantee,"  why  these 
only  ?  Why  not  Burgundy  and  Anjou — Auvergne  and  the 
Limousin  ?  Let  France  lose  what  she  may,  if  she  can  but  find 
a  Charles  and  Eoland  among  her  children,  she  will  recover  her 
empire,  though  she  had  been  beaten  back  to  the  Breche  ;  and 
if  she  find  them  not  Germany  has  all  the  guarantee  she  needs 
in  her  own  name,  and  in  her  own  right  hand. 

Let  her  look  to  it,  now,  that  her  fame  be  not  sullied.  She 
is  pressing  her  victory  too  far — dangerously  far,  as  uselessly. 
The  E^emesis  of  battle  may  indeed  be  near  her ;  greater  glory 
she  cannot  win  by  the  taking  of  Paris,  nor  the  overrunning  of 
provinces — she  only  prolongs  suffering,  redoubles  death,  extends 
loss,  incalculable  and  irremediable.  But  let  her  now  give 
unconditional  armistice,  and  offer  terms  that  France  can  accept 
with  honor,  and  she  will  bear  such  rank  among  the  nations  as 
never  yet  shone  on  Christian  history. 

For  us,  we  ought  to  help  France  now,  if  w^e  ever  did  any- 
thing, but  of  course  there  remains  for  us  only  neutrality — sell- 
ing of  coke,  and  silence  (if  we  have  grace  enough  left  to  keep 
it).  I  have  only  broken  mine  to  say  that  I  am  ashamed  to 
speak  as  being  one  of  a  nation  regardless  of  its  honor  alike  in 
trade  and  policy ;  poor,  yet  not  careful  to  keep  even  the  trea- 
sure of  probity — and  rich,  without  being  able  to  afford  itself 
the  luxury  of  courage. 

I  am,  Sii',  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  ErsKiN. 

Oct,  7. 


1876.]  MODERIT  WARFARE  29 

[From  "  Eraser's  Magazine,"  July,  1876,  pp.  121-123.1 

MODERN  WARFARE. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  Eraser's  Magaziiu\" 

Sir  :  The  article  on  inodeni  warfare  in  your  last  June 
number  ^  contains  statements  of  so  great  importance  to  public 
interests,  that  I  do  not  hesitate  to  ask  you  to  spare  me  space 
for  a  question  or  two  respecting  it,  which  hy  answering,  your 
contributor  may  make  the  facts  he  has  brought  forward  more 
valuable  for  practical  issues. 

The  statistics  f  given  in  the  second  column  of  page  695, 
on  which  P.  S.  C.  rests  his  "  incontestable"  conclusion  that 
'*  battles  are  less  sanguinary  than  they  were,"  are  incomplete 
in  this  vital  respect,  that  they  furnish  us  only  with  the  propor- 
tion, and  not  with  the  total  number,  of  combatants  slain.  A 
barricade  fight  between  a  mob  of  rioters  a  thousand  strong,  and 
a  battery  of  artillery,  in  which  fifty  reformers  get  shot,  is  not 
"  less  sanguinary"  than  a  street  quarrel  between  three  topers, 
of  whom  one  gets  knocked  on  the  head  with  a  pewter  pot : 
though  no  more  than  the  twentieth  part  of  tlie  forces  on  one 
side  fall  in  the  first  case,  and  a  third  of  the  total  forces  enofaijed, 
in  the  second.  Xor  could  it  be  proved  by  the  exhibition  of 
these  proportions  uf  loss,  that  the  substitution  of  explosive 
shells,  as  offensive  weapons,  for  pewter  pots,  rendered  wounds 
less  painful,  or  war  more  humane. 

Xow,  the  practical  diiference  between  ancient  and  modern 
war,  as  carried  on  by  civilized  nations,  is,  broadly,  of  this  kind. 
Formerly,  the  persons  who  had  quan-elled  settled  their  differ- 
ences by  the  strength  of  their  own  arms,  at  the  head  of  their 
retainers,  with  comparatively  inexpensive  weapons  such  as  they 

*  "Remarks  on  Modern  Warfare."  By  a  Military  Officer.  The  article 
was  signed  "P.  S.  C." 

f  See  the  tables  given  in  this  letter  (pp.  30  and  31). 


30  LETTEllS   OX    POLITICS   AI^D    WAR.  [1876. 

could  conveniently  -wield  ;  weapons  wliicli  tliey  had  paid  for 
out  of  their  own  pockets,  and  with  which  they  struck  only  the 
people  they  meant  to  strike :  while,  nowadays,  persons  who 
quarrel  fight  at  a  distance,  wdth  mechanical  apparatus,  for  the 
manufacture  of  which  they  have  taxed  the  public,  and  which 
will  kill  anybody  who  happens  to  be  in  the  way ;  gathering  at 
the  same  time,  to  put  into  the  way  of  them,  as  large  a  quantity 
of  senseless  and  innocent  mob  as  can  be  beguiled,  or  compelled, 
to  the  slaughter.  So  that,  in  the  words  of  your  contributor, 
"  Modern  armies  are  not  now  small  fractions  of  the  population 
whence  they  are  drawn ;  they  represent — in  fact  are — whole 
nations  in  arms."  I  have  only  to  correct  this  somewhat  vague 
and  rhetorical  statement  by  pointing  out  that  the  persons  in 
arms,  led  out  for  mutual  destruction,  are  by  no  means  "  the 
whole  nation"  on  either  side,  but  only  the  individuals  of  it  who 
are  able-bodied,  honest,  and  brave,  selected  to  be  shot,  from 
among  its  invalids,  rogues,  and  cowards. 

The  deficiencies  in  your  contributor's  evidence  as  to  the 
totality  of  loss  do  not,  however,  invalidate  his  conclusion  that, 
out  of  given  numbers  engaged,  the  mitrailleuse  kills  fewer  than 
the  musket,^  It  is,  nevertheless,  a  very  startling  conclusion, 
and  one  not  to  be  accepted  without  closer  examination  of  the 
statistics  on  wliich  it  is  based.  I  will,  therefore,  tabulate  them 
in  a  simpler  form,  which  the  eye  can  catch  easily,  omitting 
only  one  or  two  instances  which  add  nothing  to  the  force  of 
the  evidence. 

In  the  six  under-named  battles  of  bygone  times,  there  fell, 
according  to  your  contributor's  estimate,  out  of  the  total 
combatants — 

At  Austerlitz 1/7 

Jena 1/6 

Waterloo 1/5 

Marengo 1/4 

Salamanca 1/3 

Eylau 1/3.^ 

*  "The  proportion  of  killed  and  wounded,"  wrote  P.  S.  C,  "was  far 
greater  with  the  old-fashioned  weapons  than  it  is  at  the  present  day." 


1876.]  MODERN   WARFARE.  31 

wliile  in  tlie  under-named  iive  recent  l);ittl(',<  tlie  proportion  of 
loss  was — 

At  Koniggratz 1/15 

Gravelotte 1/12 

Solferiuo 1/11 

Worth 1/11 

Sedan 1/10 

Now,  there  is  a  very  important  difference  in  the  eliaracter  iA 
the  battles  named  in  these  two  lists.  Every  one  of  the  lirst 
six  was  decisive,  and  both  sides  knew  that  it  must  be  so  when 
the  engagement  began,  and  did  their  best  to  win.  But  K()nig- 
gratz  was  only  decisive  by  sudden  and  appalling  demonstration 
of  the  power  of  a  new  weapon.  Solferino  was  only  half  fought, 
and  not  followed  up  because  the  French  Emperor  had  exhausted 
his  co?ips  cf  elite  at  Magenta,  and  could  not  (or,  at  least,  so  it  is 
reported)  depend  on  his  troops  of  the  line.  Worth  was  an 
experiment ;  Sedan  a  discouraged  ruin ;  Gravelotte  was,  I 
believe,  well  contested,  but  I  do  not  know  on  what  extent  of 
the  line,  and  we  have  no  real  evidence  as  to  the  power  of 
modern  mechanics  for  death,  until  the  proportions  are  calculated, 
not  from  the  numbers  engaged,  but  from  those  under  fire  for 
equal  times.  Xow,  in  all  the  upper  list  of  battles,  probably  every 
man  of  both  armies  was  under  fire,  and  some  of  the  regiments 
under  fire  for  half  the  day  ;  while  in  the  lower  list  of  battles, 
only  fragments  of  the  line  were  hotly  engaged,  and  the  dispute 
on  any  point  reaching  its  intensity  would  be  ended  in  half  an 
hour. 

That  the  close  of  contest  is  so  rapid  may  indeed  be  one  of 
the  conditions  of  improvement  in  our  military  system  alleged 
by  your  correspondent;  and  the  statistics  he  has  brought 
foi-ward  do  indeed  clearly  prove  one  of  two  things — either  that 
modern  weapons  do  not  kill,  or  that  modern  soldiers  do  not 
fight  as  effectually  as  in  old  times.  I  do  not  know  if  this  is 
thought  a  desirable  change  in  military  circles  ;  but  I,  as  a  poor 
civilian,  beg  to  express  my  strong  objection  to  being  taxed  six 
times  over  what  I  used  to  be,  either  for  the  equipment  of 
fioldiers  who  rarely  fight,  or  the  manufacture  of  weapons  which 


32  LETTERS   OK   POLITICS   AND   WAE.  [1876. 

rarely  kill.  It  maj  be  perfectly  true  that  our  last  cruise  on 
the  Baltic  was  "  less  sanguinary"  than  that  which  concluded  in 
Copenhagen.  But  we  shook  hands  with  the  Danes  after 
fighting  them,  and  the  differences  between  us  were  ended; 
while  our  expensive  contemplation  of  the  defences  of  Cronstadt 
leaves  us  still  in  daily  dread  of  an  inspection  by  the  Kussian  of 
those  of  Calcutta. 

It  is  true  that  the  ingenuity  of  our  inventors  is  far  from 
being  exhausted,  and  that  in  a  few  years  more  we  may  be  able 
to  destroy  a  regiment  round  a  corner  and  bombard  a  fleet  over 
the  horizon ;  but  I  believe  the  effective  result  of  these  crowning 
scientific  successes  will  only  be  to  confirm  the  at  present  partial 
impression  on  the  minds  of  military  and  naval  officers,  that 
their  duty  is  rather  to  take  care  of  their  weapons  than  to  use 
them.  "  England  will  expect"  of  her  generals  and  admirals  to 
maintain  a  dignified  moral  position  as  far  as  possible  out  of  the 
enemy's  sight :  and  in  a  perfectly  scientific  era  of  seamanship 
we  shall  see  two  adverse  fleets  affected  by  a  constant  law  of 
mutual  repulsion  at  distances  of  two  or  three  hundred  miles ; 
while  in  either  squadron,  an  occasional  collision  between  the 
leading  ships,  or  inexplicable  foundering  of  the  last  imjiroved 
ones,  will  make  these  prudential  manoeuvres  on  the  whole  as 
destructive  of  the  force,  and  about  ten  times  more  costly  to  the 
pocket,  of  the  nation,  than  the  ancient,  and,  perhaps,  more 
honorable  tactics  of  poorly-armed  pugnacity. 

There  is,  however,  one  point  touched  upon  in  P.  S.  C's 
letter,  to  me  the  most  interesting  of  all,  with  respect  to  which 
the  data  for  accurate  comparison  of  our  former  and  present 
systems  are  especially  desirable,  though  it  never  seems  to  have 
occurred  to  your  corresj)ondent  to  collect  them — the  estimates, 
namely,  of  the  relative  destruction  of  civil  property; 

Of  wilful  destruction,  I  most  thankfully  acknowledge  the 
cessation  in  Christian  warfare  ;  and  in  the  great  change  between 
the  day  of  the  sack  of  Magdeburg  and  that  of  the  march  into 
Paris,  recognize  a  true  sign  of  the  apj^roach  of  the  reign  of 
national  peace.  But  of  inevitable  destruction — of  loss  inflicted 
on  the  peasant  by  the  merely  imperative  requirements  and 


1876.]  MODEllX    WARFARE.  33 

operations  of  contending  urniies — it  will  materially  liasten  the 
advent  of  such  peace,  if  we  ascertain  the  increasing  pressure 
during  our  nominally  mollilied  and  merciful. war.  The  agri- 
cultural losses  sustained  by  France  in  one  year  are  estimated 
by  your  correspondent  at  one  hundred  and  seventy  millions  of 
pounds.  Let  him  add  to  this  sum  the  agricultural  loss  neces- 
sitated in  the  same  year  throughout  Germany,  through  the 
withdrawal  of  capital  from  productive  industry,  for  the  main- 
tenance of  her  armies  ;  and  of  labor  from  it  by  their  composi- 
tion ;  and,  for  third  item,  add  the  total  cost  of  weapons,  horses, 
and  amnnmition  on  both  sides ;  and  let  him  then  inform  us 
whether  the  cost,  thus  summed,  of  a  year's  actual  war  between 
two  European  States,  is  supposed  by  military  authorities  to  be 
fairly  representative  of  that  which  the  settlement  of  political  dis- 
pute between  any  two  such  Powers,  with  modern  instruments  of 
battle,  will  on  an  average,  in  future,  involve.  If  so,  I  will  only 
venture  further  to  suggest  that  the  nations  minded  thus  to  try 
their  quarrel  should  at  least  raise  the  stakes  for  their  match 
before  they  make  the  ring,  instead  of  drawing  bills  for  them 
upon  futurity.  For  that  the  money-lenders  whose  pockets  are 
filled,  while  everybody  else's  are  emptied,  by  recent  military 
finance,  should  occultly  exercise  irresistible  influence,  not  only 
on  the  development  of  our^according  to  your  contributor — " 
daily  more  harmless  armaments,  but  also  on  the  deliberation 
of  Cabinets,  and  passions  of  the  populace,  is  me\^table  under 
present  circumstances  ;  and  the  exercise  of  such  influence,  how- 
ever advantageous  to  contractors  and  projectors,  can  scarcely  be 
held  consistent  either  with  the  honor  of  a  Senate  or  the  safety 
of  a  State.  I  am.  Sir, 

Your  faithful  servant, 

J.  RUSKIN. 

P.  S. — I  wish  I  could  get  a  broad  approximate  estimate  of 
the  expenditure  in  money,  and  loss  of  men  by  France  and 
Prussia  in  the  respective  years  of  Jena  and  Sedan,  and  by 
France  and  Austria  in  the  respective  years  of  Areola  and 
Solferino. 


I 


LETTERS   ON  POLITICAL 
ECONOMY. 


The  Depreciation  of  Gold.    1863. 

The  Law  of  Supply  and  Demand.    1864. 
•      (Three  letters:    October  26  and  29,  and  November  2.) 

Mr.  Ruskin  and  Professor  Hodgson.    1873. 

(Two  letters:    November  8  and  15.) 

Strikes  i\  Arbitration.     1865. 

Work  and  Wages.     1865. 

(Five  letters:    April  20,  22,  and  29,  and  May  4  and  20.) 

The  Standard  of  Wages.     1867. 

How  the  Rich  Spend  their  Money.     1873. 
(Three  letters:    January  23,  28,  and  30.) 

Commercial  Morality.     1875. 

The  Definition  of  Wealth.     1875. 

The  Principles  of  Property.     1877. 

On  Co-operation.     (Two  letters.)     1879-80. 


LETTERS    ON    POLITICAL    ECONOMY 


[From  '•  The  Times,"  October  8,  1863.1 
THE  DEPRECIATION  OF  GOLD. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Times." 

Sir:  Being  out  of  the  way  of  my  letters,  I  did  not,  till 
now,  see  your  excellent  article  of  the  23d  September  on  the 
depreciation  of  gold.^  Will  3'ou  allow  me,  thus  late,  a  very 
few  words  in  confirmation  of  your  statement  of  the  insufficiency 
of  the  evidence  hitherto  offered  on  that  subject  ? 

The  market  value  of  "  a  pound"  depends  less  on  the  supply 
of  gold  than  on  the  extravagance  or  economy  of  the  persons 
holding  documentary  currency  (that  is  to  say,  claim  to  goods). 
Suppose,  for  instance,  that  I  hold  stock  to  the  value  of  £500  a 
year ; — if  I  live  on  a  hundred  a  year,  and  lay  by  four  hundred, 
I  (for  the  time)  keep  down  the  prices  of  all  goods  to  the  dis- 
tributed amount  of  £100  a  year,  or,  in  other  words,  neutralize 
the  effect  on  the  market  of  400  pounds  in  gold  imported 
annually  from  xVustralia.  If,  instead  of  laying  by  this  sum  in 
paper,  I  choose  to  throw  it  into  bullion  (whether  gold-plate  or 
coin  does  not  matter),  I  not  only  keep  down  the  price  of 
goods,  but  raise  the  price  of  gold  as  a  commodity,  and  neutralize 
800  pounds'  worth  of  imported  gold.  But  if  T  annually  spend 
my  entire  500  (unproductively)  I  annually  raise  the  price  of 
goods  by  that  amount,  and  neutralize  a  correspondent  diminu- 

*  See  one  of  the  leading  articles  in  The  Times  of  Sept.  23,  1863,  upon 
the  then  panic  as  to  the  depreciation  of  gold,  excited  by  the  considerable 
fresh  discoveries  of  the  precious  metal  in  California  and  Australia. 


38  liETTERS   Ois"    POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1863. 

tion  in  the  supply  of  gold.  If  I  spend  my  500  productively, 
that  is  to  say,  so  as  to  produce  as  much  as,  or  more  than  I  con- 
sume, I  either  leave  the  market  as  I  find  it,  or  by  the  excess  of 
production  increase  the  value  of  gold. 

Similarly,  whatever  I  lay  by  will,  as  it  is  ultimately  spent 
by  my  successors,  productively  or  unproductively,  in  that 
degree  (cceteris  lyarilnis)  increase  or  lower  the  value  of  gold. 
These  agencies  of  daily  economy  have  so  much  more  power 
over  the  market  than  the  supply  from  the  mine  that  no  statis- 
tics of  which  we  are  yet  in  possession  are  (at  least  in  their 
existing  form)  sufiicient  to  prove  the  dependence  of  any  given 
phenomena  of  the  market  on  the  rate  of  metallic  supply.  The 
destruction  of  property  in  the  American  war  and  our  European 
amusements  in  the  manufacture  of  monster  guns  and  steel 
"  backings"  lower  the  value  of  money  far  more  surely  and 
fatally  than  an  increased  supply  of  bullion,  for  the  latter  may 
very  possibly  excite  parallel  force  of  productive  industry. 

But  the  lowered  value  of  money  is  often  (and  this  is  a 
very  curious  case  of  economical  back  current)  indicated,  not 
so  much  by  a  rise  in  the  price  of  goods,  as  by  a  fall  in  that 
of  labor.  The  household  lives  as  comfortably  as  it  did  on  a 
hundred  a  year,  but  the  master  has  to  work  half  as  hard  again 
to  get  it.  This  increase  of  toil  is  to  an  active  nation  often  a 
kind  of  play ;  men  go  into  it  as  into  a  violent  game ;  fathers 
of  families  die  quicker,  and  the  gates  of  orphan  asylums  are 
choked  with  applicants ;  distress  and  crime  spread  and  fester 
through  a  thousand  silent  channels ;  but  there  is  no  commer- 
cial or  elementary  convulsion ;  no  chasm  opens  into  the  abyss 
through  the  London  clay ;  no  gilded  victim  is  asked  of  the 
Guards :  the  Stock-Exchange  falls  into  no  hysterics ;  and  the 
old  lady  of  Threadneedle  Street  does  not  so  much  as  ask  for 
"My  fan,  Peter." 

I  am.  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.  Rtjskin. 

Chamounix,  Oct.  3. 


1864.]  THE   LAW    OF   SUPPLY    AND    DEMAliD.  39 

[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  October  28,  18&4.] 

THE   LAW  OF  SUPPLY  AND  DEMAND. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Tekgraph." 

Sir  :  In  jour  valuable  article  of  to-day  on  the  strike  of  the 
colliers,  while  you  lay  down  the  true  and  just  law*  respecting 
all  such  combinations,  you  take  your  stand,  in  the  outset,  on  a 
maxim  of  ])olitical  economy,  which,  however  trite,  stands  yet 
— if  I  am  not  deceived — in  need  of  much  examination  and 
qualification.  "Labor,"  you  say,  like  every  other  vendible 
commodity,  "  depends  for  its  value  on  the  relation  of  supply 
to  demand."  But,  Sir,  might  it  not  be  asked  by  any  simple 
antl  practical  person,  who  liad  heard  this  assertion  for  the  first 
time — as  I  hope  all  practical  persons  will  some  day  hear  it  for 
the  last  time — "  Yes  ;  but  what  does  demand  depend  upon,  and 
what  does  supply  depend  upon  V  If,  for  instance,  all  death- 
beds came  to  resemble  that  so  forcibly  depicted  in  your  next 
following  article,  and,  in  consequence,  the  demand  for  gin 
were  unlimitedly  increased  towards  the  close  of  human  life,t 
would  this  demand  necessitate,  or  indicate,  a  relative  increase 
in  the  "  value"  of  gin  as  a  necessary  article  of  national  wealth, 
and  liquid  foundation  of  national  prosperity  ?  Or  might  we 
not  advisably  make  some  steady  and  generally  understood  dis- 
tinction between  the  terms  "  value"  and  "  price,"  and  determine 
at  once  whether  there  be,  or  be  not,  such  a  thing  as  intrinsic 
"  value"  or  goodness  in  some  things,  and  as  intrinsic  unvalue 
or  badness  in  other  things  ;  and  as  value  extrinsic,  or  according 
to  use,  in  all  things  ?  and  whether  a  demand  for  intrinsically 
good  things,  and  a  corresponding  knowledge  of  their  use,  be 
not  conditions  likely,  on  the  whole,  to  tend  towards  national 

*  The  strike  was  amongst  the  South  Staffordshire  colliers:  the  law  laid 
down  in  the  article  that  of  free  trade. 

f  Upon  the  then  recent  and  miserable  death  of  an  Irish  gentleman,  who 
had  been  an  habitual  hard-drinker. 


40  LETTERS   ON    POLITICAL   ECOXOMT.  [1864. 

wealth?  and  whether  a  demand  for  intrinsically  bad  things, 
and  relative  experience  in  their  use,  be  not  conditions  likely 
to  lead  to  quite  the  reverse  of  national  wealth,  in  exact  pro- 
portion to  tlie  facility  of  the  supply  of  the  said  bad  tilings  ?  I 
should  be  entirely  grateful  to  you.  Sir,  or  to  any  of  your  cor- 
respondents, if  you  or  they  would  answer  these  short  questions 
clearly  for  me.  I  am,  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

J.  KUSKLN.* 

Denmark  Hill,  Oct.  26. 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  October  31, 1864.] 

THE  LAW  OF  SUPPLY  AND  DEMAND 

To  tJie  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph:' 

Sir  :  I  am  grateful  to  your  correspondent  "  Economist " 
for  trying  his  hand  on  me,  and  will  be  a  docile  pupil ;  but  I 
hope  his  hand  is  not  quite  untried  hitherto,  for  it  ^Vould  waste 
your  space,  and  my  time,  and  your  readers'  patience,  if  he 
taught  me  what  I  had  afterwards  to  unlearn.  But  I  think 
none  of  these  will  be  wasted  if  he  answers  my  questions 
clearly ;  there  are,  I  am  sure,  many  innocent  persons  who,  like 
myself,  will  be  glad  of  the  information. 

1.  He  tells  me,  then,  in  the  outset,  "  The  intrinsic  value  of 
commodities  is  a  question  outside  political  economy." 

Is  that  an  axiom  for  all  political  economists  ?  and  may  I 
put  it  down  for  future  reference  ?  I  particularly  wish  to  be 
assured  of  this. 

2.  Assuming,  for  the  present,  that  I  may  so  set  it  down, 
and  that  exchangeable  value  is  the  only  subject  of  politico- 
economical  inquiry,  I  proceed  to  my  informant's  following 
statement : 

*  To  this  letter  an  answer  {Daily  Telegraph,  October  29)  was  attempted 
by  "Economist,"  writing  from  "Lloyds,  Oct.  28,"  stating  that  "Value  in 
political  economy  means  exchangeable  value,  not  intrinsic  value."  The 
rest  of  his  letter  is  given  in  Mr.  Ruskin's  reply  to  it. 


1864. j  THE   LAW   OF   SUPPLY    AND   DEMAND.  41 

''  Tlie"  (question)  "of  intrinsic  value  belongs  to  the  domain 
of  pliilusupliy,  morals,  or  statecraft.  The  intrinsic  value  of 
anything  depends  on  its  (puilities ;  the  exchangeable  value 
depends  on  how  much  there  is  of  it,  and  how  much  people 
want  it." 

(This  "  want"  of  it  never,  of  course,  in  anywise  depending 
on  its  qualities.) 

May  Oar  CO.  Accordingly,  in  that  ancient  and  rashly-specu- 
lative adage,  "  Venture  a  sprat  to  catch  a  herring,"  it  is  only 
assumed  that  people  will  always  want  herrings  rather  than 
sprats,  and  that  there  will  always  be  fewer  of  them.  No 
reference  is  involved,  according  to  economists,  to  the  relative 
sizes  of  a  sprat  and  herring. 

Farther :  Were  a  fashionable  doctor  to  write  an  essay  on 
sprats,  and  increase  their  display  at  West-end  tables  to  that 
extent  that  unseasonable  sprats  became  worth  a  guinea  a  head, 
while  herrings  remained  at  the  old  nursery  rate  of  one  and  a 
half  for  three-halfpence,  would  my  "  recognition"  of  the  value 
of  sprats  in  paying  a  guinea  for  one  enable  me  to  dine  off  it 
better  than  I  should  off  that  mysterious  eleven-pennyworth  of 
herrine:  ?  Or  to  take  a  more  elevated  instance.  There  is  now 
on  my  room  wall  a  water-color  drawing,  which  was  once 
bought  for  £30,  and  for  which  any  dealer  would  to-morrow 
give  me  £300.  The  drawing  is  intrinsically  worth  about  one- 
tenth  of  what  it  was  when  bought  for  £30,  the  sky  having 
faded  out  of  it,  and  many  colors  having  changed  elsewhere. 
But  men's  minds  have  changed  like  the  colors,  and  Lord  A. 
or  Sir  John  B.  are  now  ready  to  give  me  £300  instead  of  £30 
for  it. 

Now,  I  want  to  know  what  it  matters  to  "  Economist,"  or 
to  the  Economical  Society  he  (as  I  understand)  represents,  or 
to  the  British  nation  generally,  whether  Lord  A.  has  the  bit  of 
colored  paper  and  I  the  £300,  or  Lord  A.  the  £300  and  I  the 
bit  of  paper.  The  pounds  are  there,  and  the  paper  is  there : 
what  does  it  nittionally  matter  which  of  us  have  which  ? 

Farther :  What  does  it  nationally  matter  whether  Lord  A. 
gives  me  £30  or  £300  on  the  exchange  ?     (Mind,  I  do  not  saj 


42  LETTERS   ON    POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1864. 

it  does  not  matter — I  only  want  ''  Economist"  to  tell  me  if  it 
does,  and  how  it  does.)  In  one  case  my  lord  has  £270  more 
to  spend ;  in  the  other  I  have.  What  does  it  signify  which  of 
US  has  ? 

Farther :  To  ns,  the  exchangers,  of  w^hat  use  is  "  Econo- 
mist's" information  that  the  rate  of  exchange  depends  on  the 
"demand  and  supply"  of  colored  paper  and  ponnds?  No 
ghost  need  come  from  the  grave  to  tell  us  that.  But  if  any 
economical  ghost  would  tell  my  lord  how  to  get  more  ponnds, 
or  me  how  to  get  more  drawings,  it  might  be  to  the  purpose. 

But  yet  farther,  passing  from  specialties  to  generals  : 

Let  the  entire  property  of  the  nation  be  enumerated  in  the 
several  articles  of  which  it  consists — a^  &,  c,  d,  etc. ;  we  will 
say  only  three,  for  convenience  sake.      Then  all  the  national 
property  consists  oi  a-\-h-\-c. 
I  ask,  first,  what  a  is  worth. 

"  Economist"  answers  (suppose)  2  h. 
I  ask,  next,  what  h  is  worth. 

"  Economist"  answers  (suppose)  3  c. 
I  ask,  next,  what  c  is  worth. 

"  Economist"  answers — -^. 

Many  thanks.     That  is  certainly  Cocker's  view  of  it. 
I  ask,  finally.  What  is  it  all  worth  ? 

"  Economist"  answers.  If  a,  or  3J  Z>,  or  10  c. 

Thanks  again.  But  now,  intrinsic  value  not  being  in 
"  Economist's"  domain,  but — if  I  chance  to  be  a  philosopher — 
in  mine,  I  may  any  day  discover  any  given  intrinsic  value  to 
belong  to  any  one  of  these  articles. 

Suppose  I  find,  for  instance,  the  value  of  c  to  be  intrinsi- 
cally zero,  then  the  entire  national  property  =  10  c  =  intrin- 
sically 0. 

Shall  I  be  justified  in  this  conclusion  ? 

3.  In  relation  to  the  question  of  strikes,  the  difiiculty,  you 
told  me  yourself,  Mr.  Editor  *  (and  doubtless  "  Economist" 
will  tell  me  also),  dej^ends  simply  on  supply  and  demand :  that 

*  See  ante,  p.  39. 


1864.]  THE   LAW   OF   SUPPLY   AND   DEMAND.  43 

is  to  say,  on  an  iindcr-supply  of  wages  and  an  over-supply  of 
laborers.  Profoiuidest  thanks  again  ;  but  I,  poor  blundering, 
thick-headed  collier,  feel  disposed  further  to  ask,  "On what  do 
this  underness  and  overness  of  supply  depend  ?"  Have  they 
any  remote  connection  with  marriage,  or  with  improvidence, 
or  with  avarice,  or  with  accumulativeness,  or  any  other  human 
weaknesses  out  of  the  ken  of  political  economy  ?  And,  what- 
ever they  arise  from,  how  are  they  to  be  dealt  with?  It 
appears  to  me,  poor  simple  collier,  that  the  shortest  way  of 
dealing  with  this  "  darned "  supply  of  laborers  will  be  by 
knocking  some  of  them  down,  or  otherwise  disabling  them  for 
the  present.  Why  is  this  mode  of  regulating  the  supply  inter- 
dicted to  me?  and  what  have  Economists  to  do  with  the 
morality  of  any  proceeding  whatever?  and,  in  t.ie  name  of 
economy  generally,  what  else  can  I  do  ?  * 

I  am,  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

J.  RusKm. 
Denmark  Hill,  Oct.  29.    [Monday.] 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  Novembers,  1864.] 

THE  LAW    OF  SUPPLY  AND  DEMAND. 

lo  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph^ 

Sir  :  Having,  unfortunately,  occupation  enough  in  my  own 
business  for  all  hours  of  the  day,  I  cannot  undertake  to  reply  to 
the  general  correspondence  which  might,  in  large  supply  to  my 
limited  demand,  propose  itself  in  your  columns.  If  my  first 
respondent,  "  Economist,"  or  any  other  person  learned  in  his 
science,  will  give  me  direct  answers  to  the  direct  questions 
asked  in   my   JVIonday's  letter,  I  may,  with  your  permission, 

*  "  Economist"  does  not  seem  to  have  continued  his  argument.  A  reply 
to  this  letter  was  however  attempted  by  "John  Phimmer,"  writing  from 
Kettering,  and  dealing  with  the  over-supply  of  laborers  and  under-supply  of 
wages,  and  Mr.  Ruskin's  possible  views  on  the  matter.  The  next  letter 
ended  the  correspondence. 


44  LETTERS    OX    POLITICAL    ECONOMY,  [1873. 

follow  tlie  points  at  issue  farther ;  if  not,  I  will  trouble  jon  no 
more.  Your  corresp'ondent  of  to-day,  Mr.  Plumnier,  may 
ascertain  whether  I  confuse  the  terms  "value"  and  "price"  by 
reference  to  the  bottom  of  the  second  column  in  page  787  of 
"  Frascr's  Magazine"  for  June,  1862.  Of  my  opinions  respect- 
ing the  treatment  of  the  Avorking  classes  he  knows  nothing, 
and  can  guess  nothing.''^ 

I  am,  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

J.  KUSKLN^. 

Denmark  Hill,  Nov.  2 


[From  "The  Scotsman,"  November  10,  1873.] 

MB.  BUSKIN  AND  PBOFESSOR  HODGSON. 

Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford, 
Nov.  Sth,  1873. 
To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Scotsman." 

SiK  :  In  your  impression  of  the  6th  inst.  I  find  a  report  of 
a  lecture  delivered  by  Professor  Hodgson  in  the  University  of 
Edinburgh  on  the  subject  of  "  Supply  and  Demand,"  in  which 
the  Professor  speaks  of  my  "  denunciations"  of  the  principles 
he  had  expounded.  Permit  me,  in  a  matter  respecting  which 
accuracy  is  of  more  importance  to  others  than  to  myself,  to 
correct  the  Professor's  expression.  I  have  never  "  denounced  " 
the  principles  expounded  by  the  Professor.  I  have  simply 
stated  that  no  such  principles  exist;  that  no  "law  of  supply 
and  demand,"  as  expounded  by  Professor  Hodgson  and  modern 
economists,  ever  did  or  can  exist. 

Professor  Hodgson,  as  reported  in  your  columns,  states  that 

*  In  the  "Essays  on  Political  Economy,"  since  reprinted  as  "  IMnnera 
Pulveris."  See  p.  10,  §  12  of  that  book,  where  the  passage  is  printed  in 
italics:  "The  reader  must,  by  anticipation,  be  warned  against  confusing 
value  with  cost,  or  with  price.  Value  is  the  life-giving  power  of  anything; 
cost,  the  quantity  of  labor  required  to  produce  it;  price,  the  quantity  of 
labor  which  its  possessor  will  take  in  exchange  for  it." 


1873.]  MR.    RU.SKIN    AND    PliOl-KSSOR    IIODGSOX.  45 

"  demand  regulates  supply.*'  lie  does  not  appear  to  entertain 
the  incomparably  more  important  economical  question,  "What 
regulates  demand  f  But  without  pressing  upon  him  that  first 
(piestion  of  all,  I  am  content  absolutely  to  contradict  and  to 
challenge  him  before  the  University  of  Edinburgh  to  maintain 
his  statement  that  "  demand  regulates  supply,"  and  together 
with  it  (if  he  has  ventured  to  advance  it)  the  correlative  propo- 
sition, ''  supply  regulates  demand." 

A.  Demand  does  not  regulate  supply. 

For  instance — there  is  at  this  moment  a  larger  demand  for 
champagne  wine  in  England  and  Scotland  than  there  was  ten 
years  ago ;  and  a  much  more  limited  supj^ly  of  champagne 
wine. 

B.  Supply  does  not  regulate  demand. 

For  instance — I  can  name  many  districts  is  Scotland  where 
the  supply  of  pure  water  is  larger  than  in  other  namable  locali- 
ties, but  where  the  inhabitants  drink  less  water  and  more  whiskey 
than  in  other  namable  localities. 

I  do  not  therefore  denounce  the  so-called  law  of  supply  and 
demand,  but  I  absolutely  deny  the  existence  of  such  law ;  and 
I  do  in  the  very  strongest  terms  denounce  the  assertion  of  the 
existence  of  such  a  law  before  the  University  of  Edinburgh  as 
disgraceful  both  to  its  assertor  and  to  the  University,  unless 
immediate  steps  be  taken  to  define,  in  scientific  terms,  the  limi 
tations  under  which  such  statement  is  to  be  understood. 

I  am,  etc., 

Jonx  Tii-sKiN."^ 


*  To  this  letter  Professor  Hodgson  replied  by  one  printed  in  the  Scots- 
man of  November  1-4. 


46  LETTERS   Oiq^   POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1873. 


[From  "  The  Scotsman,"  November  18, 1873.] 

MR.  RUSKIN  AND  PROFESSOR  HODGSON. 

Oxford,  November  15,  1873. 
To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Scotsman." 

Sir  :  For  Professor  Hodgson's  "  undue  encroachments  on 
your  space  and  his  own  time,"  I  leave  you  to  answer  to  your 
readers,  and  the  Professor  to  console  his  class.  To  his  criti- 
cisms on  my  language  and  temper  I  bow,  their  defence  being 
irrelevant  to  the  matter  in  hand.  Of  his  harmless  confusion 
of  the  word  "  correlative"  with  the  word  "  consequent"  I  take 
no  notice;  and  his  promise  of  a  sifting  examination  of  my 
economic  teaching  I  anticipate  with  grateful  a-we.^^ 

But  there  is  one  sentence  in  his  letter  of  real  significance, 
and  to  that  alone  I  reply.  The  Professor  ventured  (he  says)  to 
suggest  that  possibly  I  with  others  ^'  believe  that  economists 
confused  existing  demand  with  wise  and  beneficial  demand,  and 
existing  supply  with  wise  and  beneficial  supply." 

I  do  believe  this.  I  have  written  all  my  books  on  political 
economy  in  such  belief.  And  the  entire  gist  of  them  is  the 
assertion  that  a  real  law  of  relation  holds  between  the  non- 
existent wise  demand  and  the  non-existent  beneficial  supply, 
but  that  no  real  law  of  relation  holds  between  the  existent 
foolish  demand  and  the  existent  mischievous  supply. 

That  is  to  say  (to  follow  Professor  Hodgson  with  greater 
accuracy  into  his  lunar  illustrations),  if  you  ask  for  the  moon, 
it  does  not  follow  that  you  will  get  it ;  nor  is  your  satisfaction 
more  secure  if  you  ask  for  sixpence  from  a  Poor-Law  guardian  ; 
but  if  you  limit  your  demand  to  an  honest  penny,  and  endeavor 
to  turn  it  by  honest  work,  the  divine  law  of  supply  will,  in  the 
plurality  of  cases,  answer  that  rational  and  therefore  divine 
demand. 

*  "I  hereby  promise  Mr.  Ruskin  that  ere  very  many  months  are  over 
he  shall  have  in  print  a  sifting  examination  of  his  economic  teaching."  I 
do  not  find,  however,  that  Professor  Hodgson  fulfilled  his  promise. 


1873.]  MR.    RL-SKIX    AND    PROFKSSOU    HODGSON.  47 

Xow,  Professor  Hodgson's  stateincnt,  as  reported  in  your 
columns,  was  that  *' denuind  regulates  supply."  If  bis  asser- 
tion, in  his  lecture,  was  the  qualitied  one,  or  that ''  wise  demand 
regulates  beneficial  supply,"  your  reporter  is  much  to  be  blamed, 
the  Professor's  chiss  profoundly  to  be  congratulated,  and  this 
correspondence  is  at  an  end  ;  while  I  look  forward  with  deepest 
interest  to  the  necessary  elucidations  by  the  Professor  of  the 
nature  of  wisdom  and  benefit ;  neither  of  these  ideas  havintr 

o 

been  yet  familiar  ones  in  common  economical  treatises.  But  I 
wrote  under  the  impression  that  the  Professor  dealt  hitherto, 
as  it  has  been  the  boast  of  economists  to  deal,  with  thinors 
existent,  and  not  theoretical  (and  assuredly  the  practical  men 
of  this  country  expect  their  children  to  be  instructed  by  him  in 
the  laws  which  govern  existing  tilings);  and  it  is  therefore 
only  in  the  name  of  your  practical  readers  that  I  challenged 
him,  and  to-day  repeat  my  challenge,  in  terms  from  which  I 
trust  he  will  not  again  attempt  to  escape  by  circumambient 
criticism  of  my  works,*  to  define,  in  scientific  terms,  the  limits 
under  which  his  general  statement  that  "supply  regulates 
demand  "  is  to  be  understood.  That  is  to  say,  whether  he,  as 
Professor  of  Political  Economy,  is  about  to  explain  the  rela- 
tions (a)  of  rational  and  satiable  demand  with  beneficial  and 
benevolently-directed  supply ;  or  (b)  of  irrational  and  insatiable 
demand  with  mischievous  and  malevolently-directed  supply; 
or  (c)  of  a  demand  of  which  he  cannot  explain  the  character 
with  a  supply  of  which  he  cannot  predict  the  consequence  ? 

I  am,  etc., 

J.    KUSKIN. 

*  Professor  Hodgson's  letter  had  quoted,  with  criticism,  several  passages 
from  "Fors  Clavigera,"  "Munera  Pulveris,"  and  "Time  and  Tide." 


48  LETIEKS   02^   POLITICAL  ECONOMY.  [1865. 

[From  "  The  PaU  MaU  Gazette,"  April  18,  1865.] 

STRIKES  V.  ARBITRATION. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  PaU  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  read  jour  Gazette  so  attentively  that  I  am  always 
falling  into  arrears,  and  have  only  to-day  arrived  at  your  last 
week's  articles  on  strikes,  arbitration,  etc.,  which  afford  me  the 
greatest  satisfaction,  but  nevertheless  embarrass  me  somewhat. 
Will  you  permit  me  to  ask  for  a  word  or  two  of  further  eluci- 
dation ? 

I  am  an  entirely  selfish  person,  and  having  the  means  of 
indulging  myself  (in  moderation),  should,  I  believe,  have  led  a 
comfortable  life,  had  it  not  been  for  occasional  fits  and  twinges 
of  conscience,  to  which  I  inherit  some  family  predisposition, 
and  from  which  I  suffer  great  uneasiness  in  cloudy  weather. 
Articles  like  yours  of  Wednesday,*  on  i\\Q  proper  attention  to 
one's  own  interests,  are  very  comforting  and  helpful  to  me ; 
but,  as  I  said,  there  are  yet  some  })oints  in  them  I  do  not  under- 
stand. 

Of  course  it  is  right  to  arrange  all  one's  business  with  refer- 
ence to  one's  own  interest ;  but  what  will  the  practical  differ- 
ence be  ultimately  between  such  arrangement  and  the  old  and 
simple  conscientious  one  ?  In  those  bygone  days,  I  remember, 
one  endeavored,  with  such  rough  estimate  as  could  be  quickly 
made,  to  give  one's  Roland  for  one's  Oliver ;  if  a  man  did  you 
a  service,  you  tried  in  return  to  do  as  much  for  him ;  if  he 

*  The  articles  alluded  to  were,  one  upon  "Strikes  and  Arbitration 
Courts,"  in  the  Gazette  of  Wednesday,  the  12th,  and  one  on  "The  Times 
on  Trade  Arbitration,"  in  the  Gazette  of  Thursday,  the  13th.  The  former 
dealt  with  the  proposal  to  decide  questions  raised  by  strikes  by  reference 
to  courts  of  arl)itration.  Amongst  the  sentences  contained  in  it,  and 
alluded  to  by  Mr.  Ruskin,  were  the  following:  "  Phrases  about  the  '  princi- 
ples of  right  and  justice'  are  always  suspicious  and  generally  fallacious." 
"The  rate  of  wages  is  determined  exclusively  by  self-interest."  "There 
is  no  such  thing  as  a  '  fair '  rate  of  wages  or  a  '  just '  rate  of  wages." 


1865.]  STKIKES    V.    ARBITRATION.  49 

broke  your  head,  yoii  bi'oke  liis,  sliook  hands,  and  were  both 
tlie  better  for  it.  Contrariwise,  on  this  modern  principle  of 
self-interest,  I  understand  very  well  that  if  a  man  does  me  a 
service,  I  am  always  to  do  the  least  I  can  in  return  for  it;  but 
I  don't  see  how  I  am  always  to  get  more  out  of  him  than  he 
gets  out  of  me.  I  dislike  any  references  to  abstract  justice  as 
much  as  you  do,  but  I  cannot  see  my  way  to  keepin<;-  this  injus- 
tice always  in  my  own  favor ;  and  if  1  cannot,  it  seems  to  me 
the  matter  may  as  well  be  settled  at  first,  as  it  must  come  to  be 
settled  at  last,  in  that  disagreeably  just  way. 

Thus,  for  instance,  in  producing  a  piece  of  iron  for  the  mar- 
ket, one  man  digs  it,  another  smelts  it,  another  puddles  it,  and 
I  sell  it.  We  get  so  much  between  us  four ;  and  I  suppose 
your  conscientious  people  would  say  that  the  division  of  the 
pay  should  have  some  reference  to  the  hardness  of  the  work, 
and  the  time  spent  in  it.  It  is  true  that  by  encouraging  the 
diggers  and  puddlers  to  spend  all  they  get  in  drink,  and  by 
turning  them  olf  as  soon  as  I  hear  they  are  laying  by  money, 
it  may  yet  be  possible  to  get  them  for  some  time  to  take  less 
than  I  suppose  they  should  have;  but  I  cannot  hide  from  my- 
self that  the  men  are  beginning  to  understand  the  game  a  little 
themselves ;  and  if  they  should,  with  the  help  of  those  con- 
founded— (I  beg  pardon!  I  forgot  that  one  does  not  print  such 
expressions  in  Pall  Mall) — education-mongers,  learn  to  be  men, 
and  to  look  after  their  own  business  as  I  do  mine,  what  am  I 
to  do?  Even  at  present  I  don't  feel  easy  in  telling  them  that 
I  ought  to  have  more  money  than  they  because  I  know  better 
how  to  spend  it,  for  even  this  involves  a  distant  reference  to 
notions  of  propriety  and  principle  which  I  would  gladly  avoid. 
Will  you  kindly  tell  me  what  is  best  to  be  done  (or  said)  ? 
I  am,  Sir,  your  obliged  servant, 

John  Rusein. 

Easier  Monday,  1865. 


50  LETTERS   OX    POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1865. 


[From  the  "  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  April  21,  1865.] 

WORK  AND    WAGES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  TJie  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  am  not  iisnally  unready  for  controversy,  but  I  dis- 
like it  in  spring,  as  I  do  the  east  wind  {j^ace  Mr.  Kingsley), 
and  I  both  regret  having  given  occasion  to  the  only  dull  leader 
which  has  yet  *  appeared  in  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette^  and  the 
necessity  I  am  involved  in  of  dissecting  the  same,  instead  of  a 
violet,  on  which  I  was  about  this  morning  to  begin  operations.' 

But  I  see.  Sir,  that  you  mean  fairly,  and  that  you  have 
careful  thinkers  and  writers  on  your  staff.  And  I  will  accept 
your  battle,  if  you  will  light  with  short  swords,  which  is  clearly 
your  interest,  for  such  another  article  would  sink  the  Gazette  j 
and  mine,  for  I  have  no  time  to  answer  s]3eculations  on  what 
you  writers  suppose  my  opinions  may  be,  ^'  if  we  understand  " 
them. 

You  shall  understand  them  utterly,  as  I  already  understand 
yours.  I  will  not  call  yours  "fallacies"  a  priori ;  you  shall 
not  call  mine  so.  I  will  not  tell  you  of  your  "  unconscious" 
meanings  ;  you  shall  not  tell  me  of  mine.f  But  I  will  ask  you 
the  plainest  questions,  and  make  to  you  the  plainest  answers  my 
English  will  admit  of,  on  one  point  at  a  time  only,  expecting 
you  also  to  ask  or  answer  as  briefly,  without  divergence  or 
deprecation.  And  twenty  lines  will  always  contain  all  I  would 
say,  at  any  intervals  of  time  you  choose. 

*  The  Gazette  was  at  this  time  of  little  more  than  eight  weeks'  standing. 
The  dull  leader  was  that  in  the  Gazette  of  April  19,  entitled  "  Masters  and 
Men,"  and  dealt  entirely  with  Mr.  Ruskin's  letter  on  strikes.  The  ''pace 
Mr.  Kingsley"  alludes,  of  course,  to  his  "  Ode  to  the  North-East  Wind." 

f  The  leader  had  hegun  by  speaking  of  Mr.  Ruskin's  previous  letter  as 
"  embodying  fallacies,  pernicious  in  the  highest  degree,"  and  concluded  by 
remarking  how  "easily  and  unconsciously  he  glided  into  the  true  result  of 
his  principles." 


1865.]  WORK    AND   WAGES.  51 

For  example  :  I  said  I  must  "  dissect"  your  leader,  meaning 
that  I  should  have  to  take  a  piece  of  it,  as  I  would  of  my 
flower,  and  deal  with  that  first ;  then  with  its  sequences. 

I  take  this  sentence  then  :  "  lie  (Mr.  R.)  seems  to  think 
that  apart  from  the  question  of  the  powers  of  the  parties, 
there  is  some  such  thing  as  a  just  rate  of  wages.  He  seems  to 
be  under  the  impression  that  the  wages  ought  to  be  propor- 
tioned, not  to  the  supply  and  demand  of  labor  and  capital,  but 
*  to  the  hardship  of  the  work  and  the  time  spent  in  it.'  " 

Yes,  Sir,  I  am  decisively  under  that  impression — as  deci- 
sively as  ever  Greek  coin  was  under  its  impression.  You  will 
beat  me  out  of  all  shape,  if  you  can  beat  me  out  of  this.  Will 
you  join  issue  on  it,  and  are  these  following  statements  clear 
enough  for  you,  either  to  accept  or  deny,  in  as  positive  terms? — 

I.  A  man  should  in  justice  be  paid  for  two  hours'  work 
twice  as  much  as  for  one  hour's  work,  and  for  n  hours'  work  n 
times  as  much,  if  the  effort  be  similar  and  continuous. 

II.  A  man  should  in  justice  be  paid  for  difficult  or  danger- 
ous work  proportionately  more  than  for  easy  and  safe  work, 
supposing  the  other  conditions  of  the  work  similar. 

III.  (And  now  look  out,  for  this  proposition  involves  the 
ultimate  principle  of  all  just  wages.)  If  a  man  does  a  given 
quantity  of  work  for  me,  I  am  bound  in  justice  to  do,  or  pro- 
cure to  be  done,  a  precisely  equal  cjuantity  of  work  for  him ; 
and  just  trade  in  labor  is  the  exchange  of  equivalent  quantities 
of  labor  of  different  kinds. 

If  you  pause  at  this  word  "  equivalent,"  you   shall  have 
definition  of  it  in  my  next  letter.     I  am  sure  you  will  in  fair- 
ness insert  this  challenge,  whether  you  accept  it  or  decline. 
I  am,  Sir,  your  obliged  servant, 

John  Ruskin.* 
Denmark  Hill,  Thursday,  April  20. 

*  In  reply,   the  Gazette  denied  "each  of  the  three  propositions  to  be 
true,"  on  grounds  shown  in  the  quotations  given  in  the  following  letter. 


52  LETTEKS  ON   POLITICAL  ECOKOMY.  [1865. 

[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  April  25, 1865.] 

WOBK  AND   WAGES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

SiK  :  I  accept  your  terms,  and  reply  in  the  fewest  words  I 
can. 

I.  You  "  see  no  injustice  in  hiring  a  fly  for  ^s.  6d.  for  the 
first  hour  and  1^.  6d.  for  each  succeeding  one."  Nor  I  either ; 
so  far  from  it,  that  I  never  give  a  cabman  less  than  a  shilling; 
which  I  doubt  not  is  j^our  practice  also,  and  a  very  proper  one. 
The  cabmen  make  no  objection,  and  you  could  not  have  given 
a  neater  instance  of  the  proportion  of  payment  to  labor  which 
you  deny.  You  pay  in  the  first  hour  for  the  various  trouble 
involved  in  taking  the  man  off  his  stand,  and  for  a  proportion 
of  the  time  during  which  he  has  waited  for  the  chance  of  your 
custom.  That  paid,  you  hire  him  by  the  formula  which  I 
state,  and  you  deny. 

II.  "  Danger  and  diflSculty  have  attractions  for  some  men." 
They  have,  and  if,  under  the  influence  of  those  attractions, 
they  choose  to  make  you  a  present  of  their  labor,  for  love  (in 
your  own  terms,^  "  as  you  give  a  penny  to  a  beggar"),  you  may 
accept  the  gift  as  the  beggar  does,  without  question  of  justice. 
But  if  they  do  not  choose  to  give  it  you,  they  have  a  right  to 
higher  payment.  My  guide  may  perhaps,  for  love,  play  at 
climbing  Mont  Blanc  with  me ;  if  he  will  not,  he  has  a  right 
to  be  paid  more  than  for  climbing  the  Breven. 

III.  "Mr.  Ruskin  can  define  justice,  or  any  other  word,  as 
he  chooses." 

It  is  a  gracious  permission  ;  but  suppose  justice  be  some- 
thing more  than  a  word  !  When  you  derived  it  iromjussmyi-f 
(falsely,  for  it  is  not  derived  iromjussum,  but  from  the  root  of 

*  These  "terms"  were  simply  that  the  Gazette  should  have  the  right  of 
determining  how  much  of  the  proposed  controversy  was  worth  its  space, 
t  In  the  article  of  April  12. 


1865.]  WORK   AXD    WAGES.  53 

jiingo)^  you  forgot,  or  ignored,  that  tlie  Saxons  had  also  a  word 
for  it,  by  which  the  English  workman  still  pleads  for  it ;  that  the 
Greeks  had  a  word  for  it,  by  which  Plato  and  St.  Paul 
reasoned  of  it ;  and  that  the  Powers  of  Heaven  have,  presum- 
ably, an  idea  of  it  with  which  it  may  be  well  for  ''  our  interests" 
that  your  definition,  as  well  as  mine,  should  ultimately  corre- 
spond, since  their  ''detinitions"  are  commonly  not  by  a  word 
but  a  blow. 

But  accepting  for  the  nonce  your  own  conception  of  it  as 
"the  fulfilment  of  a  compulsory  agreement"  ("the  wages" 
you  say  ''which  yoM force  the  men  to  take,  and  they  c'^.\\ force 
you  to  pay"),  allow  me  to  ask  your  definition  of  force,  or  com- 
pulsion. As  thus:  {Case  1.)  I  agree  with  my  friend  that  we 
will  pay  a  visit  to  Mr.  A.  at  two  in  the  morning.  My  friend 
agrees  with  me  that  he  will  hold  a  pistol  to  Mr.  A.'s  head. 
Under  those  circumstances,  I  agree  with  Mr.  A.  that  I  shall 
remove  his  plate  without  expression  of  objection  on  his  part. 
Is  this  agreement,  in  your  sense,  "•  jussum^''\  {Case  2.)  Mr.  B. 
goes  half  through  the  ice  into  the  canal  on  a  frosty  morning. 
I,  on  the  shore,  agree  with  Mr.  B.  that  I  shall  have  a  hundred 
pounds  for  throwing  him  a  rope.  Is  this  agreement  validly 
^^jussurrC^  ? 

The  first  of  these  cases  expresses  in  small  compass  the 
general  nature  of  arrangements  under  compulsory  circum- 
stances over  which  one  of  the  parties  has  entire  control.  The 
second,  that  of  arrangements  made  under  circumstances  acci- 
dentally compulsory,  when  the  capital  is  in  one  party's  hands 
exclusively.  For  you  will  observe  Mr.  B.  has  no  right  what- 
ever to  the  use  of  my  rope :  and  that  capital  (though  it  would 
probably  have  been  only  the  final  result  of  my  operations  with 
respect  to  Mr.  A.)  makes  me  completely  master  of  the  situation 
with  reference  to  Mr.  B. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obliged  servant, 

John  Kuskin.* 
Denmark  Hill,  Saturday,  Apnl  22,  1865. 

*  For  the  Oazette's  reply  to  this,  see  the  notes  to  the  following  letter. 


54  LETTERS   OX   POLITICAL   ECOKOMY.  [1865. 


[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  May  2, 1885.] 

WORK  AND   WAQE8. 

To  fhe  Editor  of  "  Tlie  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  have  not  hastened  my  reply  to  your  last  letter,  think- 
ing that  your  space  at  present  would  be  otherwise  occupied ; 
having  also  my  own  thoughts  busied  in  various  directions,  such 
as  you  may  fancy  ;  yet  busied  chiefly  in  a  sad  wonder,  which 
perhaps  you  would  not  fancy.  I  mourn  for  Mr.  Lincoln,"^  as  man 
should  mourn  the  fate  of  man,  w4ien  it  is  sudden  and  supreme. 
I  hate  regicide  as  I  do  populicide — deeply,  if  frenzied ;  more 
deeply,  if  deliberate.  But  my  w^onder  is  in  remembering  the 
tone  of  the  English  people  and  press  respecting  this  man  during 
his  life  ;  and  in  comparing  it  with  their  sayings  of  him  in  his 
death.  They  caricatured  and  reviled  him  when  his  cause  was 
poised  in  deadly  balance — when  their  praise  would  have  been 
grateful  to  him,  and  their  help  priceless.  They  now  declare 
his  cause  to  have  been  just,  when  it  needs  no  aid  ;  and  his 
purposes  to  have  been  noble,  when  all  human  thoughts  of  them 
have  become  vanity,  and  will  never  so  much  as  mix  their 
murmurs  in  his  ears  with  the  sentence  of  the  Tribunal  which 
has  summoned  him  to  receive  a  juster  praise  and  tenderer 
blame  than  ours. 

I  have  twice  (I  see)  used  the  word  "  just "  inadvertently, 
forgetting  that  it  has  no  meaning,  or  may  mean  (you  tell  me) 
quite  what  we  choose ;  and  that  so  far  as  it  has  a  meaning, 
"the  important  question  is  not  whether  the  action  is  just." 
Indeed  w^hen  I  read  this  curious  sentence  in  your  reply  on 
Tuesday  last,  "  Justice,  as  we  use  it,  implies  merely  the  con- 

*  President  Lincoln  was  shot  while  in  his  private  box  at  Ford's  Theatre, 
Washington,  on  the  night  of  April  14,  1865,  and  died  early  the  next 
morning.  His  assassin,  J.  Wilkes  Booth,  was  pursued  to  Caroline  County, 
Virginia,  where  he  was  fired  on  by  the  soldiery  and  killed.  A  letter  was 
found  upon  him  ascribing  his  conduct  to  his  devotion  to  the  Southern 
States. 


1865.]  WORK   AND   WAGES.  55 

formitj  of  an  action  to  any  rules  wliatever,  good  or  bad,"  I 
had  nearly  closed  the  discussion  by  telling  you  that  there 
remained  no  ground  on  which  we  could  meet,  for  the  English 
workmen,  in  whose  name  I  wrote  to  you,  asked,  not  for  con- 
formity with  bad  rules,  but  enactment  of  good  ones.  But  I 
will  not  pounce  upon  these  careless  sentences,  which  you  are 
forced  to  write  in  all  haste,  and  at  all  disadvantage,  while  I 
have  the  definitions  and  results  determined  through  years  of 
quiet  labor,  lying  ready  at  my  hand.  You  never  meant  what 
you  wrote  (when  I  said  I  would  not  tell  you  of  unconscious 
meanings,  I  did  not  promise  not  to  tell  you  of  unconscious 
wants  of  meanings) ;  but  it  is  for  you  to  tell  me  what  you  mean 
by  a  bad  rule,  and  what  by  a  good  one.  Of  the  law  of  the 
Eternal  Lawgiver,  it  is  dictated  that  "  the  commandment  is 
holy,  and  just,  and  good."  ]N'ot  merely  that  it  is  a  law  ;  but  that 
it  is  such  and  such  a  law.  Are  these  terms  senseless  to  you  ? 
or  do  you  understand  by  them  only  that  the  observance  of  that 
law  is  generally  conducive  to  our  interests  ?  And  if  so,  what 
are  our  interests  ?  Have  we  ever  an  interest  in  heing  some- 
thing, as  well  as  in  getting  something ;  may  not  even  all  getting 
be  at  last  summed  in  being  ?  is  it  not  the  uttermost  of  inter- 
ests to  be  just  rather  than  unjust?  Let  us' leave  catching  at 
phrases,  and  try  to  look  in  each  other's  faces  and  hearts  ;  so 
define  our  thoughts  ;  then  reason  from  them.     [See  below.]  - 

Yet,  lest  you  say  I  evade  you  in  generalities,  here  is  present 
answer  point  by  point. 

I.  "  The  fare  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  labor  in  preparing 
the  fly  for  being  hired." — Nor,  of  course,  the  price  of  any 
article  with  the  labor  expended  in  preparing  it  for  being  sold  ? 
This  will  be  a  useful  note  to  the  next  edition  of  "  Kicardo." 
[The  price  depends  on  the  relative  forces  of  the  buyer  and  the 
seller.  The  price  asked  by  the  seller  no  doubt  depends  on  the 
labor  expended.  The  price  given  by  the  buyer  depends  on 
the  degree  in  which  he  desires  to  possess  the  thing  sold,  which 
has  nothing  to  do  with  the  labor  laid  out  on  it.] 

*  The  bracketed  [sic]  interpolations  are  the  remarks  of  the  Gazette, 


66  LETTERS    ON    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  [1865. 

The  answer  to  your  instances*  is  that  all  just  price  involves 
an  allowance  for  average  necessary,  not  for  unnecessary,  labor. 
The  just  price  of  coals  at  Newcastle  does  not  involve  an  allow- 
ance for  their  carriage  to  Newcastle.  But  the  just  price  of  a 
cab  at  a  stand  involves  an  allowance  to  the  cabman  for  having 
stood  there.     [Why  ?  who  is  to  determine  what  is  necessary  ?] 

II.  "  This  admits  the  principle  of  Bargaining."  No,  Sir ; 
it  only  admits  the  principle  of  Begging.  If  you  like  to  ask 
your  guide  to  give  you  his  legs  for  nothing,  or  your  work- 
man his  arms  for  nothing,  or  your  shopkeeper  his  goods 
for  nothing,  and  they  consent,  for  love,  or  for  play  —  you 
are  doubtless  both  dignified  and  fortunate ;  but  there  is  no 
question  of  trade  in  the  matters ;  only  of  Alms.  [AYe  mean 
by  Alms  money  or  goods  given  merely  from  motives  of  benevo- 
lence, and  without  return.  In  the  case  supposed  the  guide 
goes  one  mile  to  please  himself,  and  ten  more  for  hire,  which 
satisfies  him.  How  does  he  give  Alms?  He  goes  for  less 
money  than  he  otherwise  would  require,  because  he  likes  the 
job,  not  because  his  employer  likes  it.  The  Alms  are  thus 
given  by  himself  to  himself.] 

III.  It  is  true  that  "  every  one  can  affix  to  words  any 
sense  he  chooses."  *  But  if  I  pay  for  a  yard  of  broadcloth,  and 
the  shopman  cuts  me  three-quarters,  I  shall  not  put  uj:*  with 
my  loss  more  patiently  on  being  informed  that  Bishop  Butler 
meant  by  justice  something  quite  different  from  what  Bentham 
meant  by  it,  or  that  to  give  for  every  yard  three-quarters,  is 
the  rule  of  that  establishment.  [If  the  word  "yard"  were  as 
ambiguous  as  the  word  "justice,"  Mr.  Ruskin  ought  to  be 
much  obliged  to  the  shopman  for  defining  his  sense  of  it, 
especially  if  he  gave  you  full  notice  before  he  cut  the  cloth.] 

Further,  it  is  easy  to  ascertain  the  uses  of  words  by  the  best 
scholars — [Nothing  is  more  difficult.  To  ascertain  what  Locke 
meant  by  an  "  idea,"  or  Sir  W.  Hamilton  by  the  word  "  incon- 

*  One  of  the  instances  given  by  the  Gazette  on  this  point  was  that  a  sov- 
ereign made  of  Californian  gold  will  not  buy  more  wool  at  Sydnej^  than  a 
sovereign  made  of  Australian  gold,  although  far  more  labor  will  have  been 
expended  in  bringing  it  to  Sydney. 


1865]  WORK    AND    WAGES.  57 

ceivable,"  is  no  easy  task.] — and  well  to  adopt  them,  because 
they  are  sure  to  he  founded  on  the  feehngs  of  gentlemen. — • 
[Different  gentlemen  feel  and  think  in  very  different  ways. 
Though  we  differ  from  Mr.  Ruskin,  we  hope  he  will  not  deny 
this.]  Thus,  when  Horace  couples  his  tenaceni  propositi  with 
Justufn,  he  means  to  assert  tliat  the  tenacity  is  only  noble 
which  is  justilied  by  uprightness,  and  shows  itself  by  insuffer- 
ance  of  the  jussa  ^' prava  juhentiumy  And  although  Portia 
does  indeed  accept  your  delinition  of  justice  from  the  lips  of 
Shylock,  changing  the  divine,  "  who  sweareth  to  his  own  hurt, 
and  changetli  not ''  into  the  somewhat  less  divine  ''  who  swear- 
eth to  his  neighbor's  liurt  and  changeth  not ;''  and  though  she 
carries  out  his  and  your  conception  of  such  justice  to  the  utter- 
most, the  result  is  not,  even  in  Shylock's  view  of  it,  "  for  the 
interest  of  both  parties." 

lY.    To  your  two   final   questions  "exhausting"   (by  no 
means,  my  dear  Sir,  I  assure  you)  '•  the  points  at  issue,"  *  I 

*  The  Gazette's  criticism  on  the  previous  letter  had  conchided  thus: 

The  following  questions  exhaust  the  points  at  issue  between  Mr.  Ruskin 
and  ourselves: 

Is  every  man  bound  to  purchase  any  service  or  any  goods  offered  him 
at  a  "just"  price,  he  having  the  money? 

If  yes,  there  is  an  end  of  private  property. 

If  no,  the  purchaser  must  be  at  liberty  to  refuse  to  buy  if  it  suits  his 
interest  to  do  so.  Suppose  he  does  refuse,  and  thereupon  the  seller  offers 
to  lower  his  price,  it  being  his  interest  to  do  so,  is  the  purchaser  at  liberty 
to  accept  that  offer? 

If  yes,  the  whole  principle  of  bargaining  is  admitted,  and  the  "justice" 
of  the  price  becomes  immaterial. 

If  no,  each  party  of  the  supposition  is  compelled  by  justice  to  sacrifice 
their  interest.     Why  should  they  do  so? 

The  following  is  an  example:  The  "just"  price  of  a  guide  up  Mont 
Blanc  is  (suppose)  100  francs.  I  have  only  50  francs  to  spare.  May  I  with 
out  injustice  offer  the  50  francs  to  a  guide,  who  would  otherwise  get 
nothing,  and  may  he  without  injustice  accept  my  offer?  If  not,  I  lose  my 
excursion,  and  he  loses  his  opportunity  of  earning  50  francs.  Why  should 
this  be? 

In  addition  to  the  above  interpolations,  the  Gazette  appended  a  note  to 
this  letter,  in  which  it  declared  its  definition  of  justice  to  be  a  quotation 
from  memory  of  Austin's  definition  adopted  by  him  from  Ilobbes,  and  after 
referring  Mr.  Ruskin  to  Austin  for  the  mnraf  bearings  of  the  question,  con- 


58  LETTERS   ON    POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1865. 

reply  in  both  cases,  "  No."  And  to  your  plaintive  ^'  why 
should  they  do  so  ?"  while,  observe,  I  do  not  admit  it  to  be  a 
monstrous  requirement  of  men  that  they  should  sometimes 
sacrifice  their  own  interests,  I  would  for  the  present  merely 
answer  that  I  have  never  found  my  own  interests  seriously 
compromised  by  my  practice,  which  is,  when  I  cannot  get  the 
fair  price  of  a  thing,  not  to  sell  it,  and  when  I  cannot  give  the 
fair  price  of  a  thing,  not  to  buy  it.  The  other  day,  a  dealer  in 
want  of  money  oifered  me  a  series  of  Hartz  minerals  for  two- 
thirds  of  their  value.  I  knew  their  value,  but  did  not  care  to 
spend  the  entire  sum  which  would  have  covered  it.  I  there- 
fore chose  forty  specimens  out  of  the  seventy,  and  gave  the 
dealer  what  he  asked  for  the  whole. 

In  the  example  you  give,  it  is  not  the  interest  of  the  guide 
to  take  his  fifty  francs  rather  than  nothing ;  because  all  future 
travellers,  though  they  could  afford  the  hundred,  would  then 
say,  ''  You  went  for  fifty  ;  we  will  give  you  no  more."  [Does 
a  man  say  to  a  broker,  "  You  sold  stock  yesterday  at  90  ;  I  will 
pay  no  more  to-day"  ?]  And  for  me,  if  I  am  not  able  to  pay 
my  hundred  francs,  I  either  forego  Mont  Blanc,  or  climb 
alone ;  and  keep  my  fifty  francs  to  pay  at  another  time,  for  a 
less  service,  some  man  who  also  would  have  got  nothing  other- 
wise, and  who  will  be  honestly  paid  by  what  I  give  him,  for 
what  I  ask  of  him. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obliged  servant, 

John  Ruskin, 

Saturday,  29th  April,  1865. 

eluded  by  summing  up  its  views,  which  it  doubted  if  Mr.  Ruskin  under- 
stood,  and  insisting  on  the  definition  of  "  justice"  as  "  conformity  with  any 
rule  whatever,  good  or  bad,"  and  on  that  of  good  rules  as  "those  which 
promote  the  general  happiness  of  those  whom  they  affect."  (See  the  next 
letter.) 


1865.J  WOKK    AxND    WAGES.  OU 

[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  May  9,  1865.] 
WOIiK  AM)    WAGES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  T7ie  Pall  Mall  Gazette. " 

'  Sir  :  I  am  under  the  impression  tliat  we  are  botli  gcttini^ 
prosy,  or,  at  all  events,  that  no  one  will  read  either  my  last 
letter,  or  your  comments  upon  it,  in  the  places  in  which  you 
have  so  gracefully  introduced  them.  For  which  I  am  sorry, 
and  you,  I  imagine,  are  not. 

It  is  true  that  differences  of  feeling  may  exist  among 
gentlemen ;  yet  I  think  that  gentlemen  of  all  countries  agree 
that  it  is  rude  to  interru23t  your  opponent  while  he  is  speaking  ; 
for  a  futile  answer  gains  no  real  force  by  becoming  an  inter- 
jection ;  and  a  strong  one  can  abide  its  time.  I  will  therefore 
pray  you,  in  future,  if  you  publish  my  letters  at  all,  to 
practice  towards  them  so  much  of  old  English  manners  as 
may  yet  be  found  lingering  round  some  old  English  dinner- 
tables  ;  where,  though  we  may  be  compelled  by  fashion  to 
turn  the  room  into  a  green-house,  and  serve  everything  cold, 
the  pieces  de  resistance  are  still  presented  whole,  and  carved 
afterwards. 

Of  course  it  is  open  to  you  to  reply  that  I  dislike  close 
argument.  Which  little  flourish  being  executed,  and  if  you 
are  well  breathed — en  (jarde^  if  you  ])lease. 

I.  Your  original  position  was  that  wages  (or  price)  bear  no 
relation  to  hardship  of  work.  On  that  I  asked  you  to  join 
issue.  You  now  admit,  though  with  apparent  reluctance,  that 
''  the  price  asked  by  the  seller,  no  doubt,  depends  on  the 
labor  expended." 

The  price  asked  by  the  seller  has,  I  believe,  in  respectable 
commercial  houses,  and  respectable  shops,  very  approximate 
relation  to  the  price  paid  by  the  buyer.  I  do  not  know  if  yon 
are  in  the  habit  of  asking,  from  your  ^vine-merchant  or  tailor, 
reduction  of  price  on  the  ground  that  the  sum  remitted  will 
be  "  alms  to  themselves ;"  but,  having  been  myself  in  some- 


60  LETTERS   ON"   POLITICAL   ECOi^^OMY.  [1865. 

what  intimate  connection  with  a  house  of  business  in  the 
City,*  not  dishonorably  accounted  of  during  the  last  forty 
years,  I  know  enough  of  their  correspondents  in  every 
important  town  in  the  United  Kingdom  to  be  sure  that 
they  will  bear  me  witness  that  the  difference  between  the 
prices  asked  and  the  prices  taken  was  always  a  very  "imagi- 
nary" quantity. 

But  urging  this  no  farther  for  the  present,  and  marking, 
for  gained  ground,  only  your  admission  that  "  the  price  asked 
depends  on  the  labor  expended,"  will  you  farther  tell  me, 
wliether  that  dependence  is  constant,  or  variable  ?  If  constant, 
under  what  law ;  if  variable,  within  what  limits  ? 

II.  "  The  alms  are  thus  given  by  himself  to  himself."  I 
never  said  they  were  not.  1  said  it  was  a  question  of  alms, 
not  of  trade.  And  if  your  original  leader  had  only  been  an 
exhortation  to  English  workmen  to  consider  every  diminution 
of  their  pay,  in  the  picturesque  though  perhaps  somewhat 
dim,  religious  liglit  of  alms  paid  by  themselves  to  themselves,  I 
never  should  have  troubled  you  with  a  letter  on  the  subject.  For, 
singular  enough,  Sir,  this  is  not  one  of  the  passages  of  your  let- 
ters, however  apparently  indefensible,  which  I  care  to  attack. 

So  far  from  it,  in  my  own  serious  writings  I  have  always 
maintained  that  the  best  work  is  done,  and  can  only  be  done, 
for  love.f  But  the  point  at  issue  between  us  is  not  whether 
there  should  be  charity,  but  whether  there  can  be  trade ;  not 
whether  men  may  give  away  their  labor,  but  whether,  if  they 
do  not  choose  to  do  so,  there  is  such  a  thing  as  a  price  for  it. 
And  my  statement,  as  opposed  to  yours,  is  briefly  this — that 
for  all  laboi*,  there  is,  under  given  circumstances,  a  just  price 
approximately  determinable ;  that  every  conscious  deflection 
from  this  price  towards  zero  is  either  gift  on  the  part  of  the 

*  That  of  Messrs.  Ruskin,  Telford  Domecq,  in  which  Mr.  Ruskin's 
father,  "who  began  life  as  a  wine-merchant"  ("Fors  Clavigera,"  Letter 
10,  p.  5,  1871),  had  been  a  partner. 

t  See  §  41  of  "The  Crown  of  Wild  Olive,"  p.  50  of  the  1873  edition. 
"None  of  the  best  head-work  in  art,  literature,  or  science,  is  ever  paid  for. 
.  .  .  It  is  indeed  very  clear  that  God  means  all  ihorouglily  good  work  and 
talk  to  be  done  for  nothin<>." 


1865.J  WORK    AXD    WAGES.  61 

laborer,  or  theft  on  the  part  of  the  employer;  and  that  all 
payment  in  conscious  excess  of  this  price  is  either  theft  on 
the  part  of  the  laborer,  or  gift  on  that  of  the  employer. 

III.  If  you  wish  to  substitute  the  w^ord  ''  moral "  for 
"just"  in  the  above  statement,  I  am  prepared  to  allow  the 
substitution ;  only,  as  you,  not  I,  introduced  this  new  word,  I 
must  pray  for  your  definition  of  it  first,  whether  remembered 
from  Mr.  Hobbes,  or  original. 

lY.  I  am  sorry  you  doubt  my  understanding  your  views  ; 
but,  in  that  case,  it  may  be  well  to  ask  for  a  word  or  two  of 
farther  elucidation. 

"  Justice,"  you  say,  is  "  conformity  with  any  nile  Avhatever, 
good  or  bad."  And  "  good  rules  are  rules  which  promote  the 
general  happiness  of  those  whom  they  affect."  And  bad  rules 
are  (therefore)  rules  wdiicli  promote  the  general  misery  of 
those  whom  they  affect  i  Justice,  therefore,  may  as  often  as 
not  promote  the  general  misery  of  those  who  practice  it  ?  Do 
you  intend  this  ?  * 

Again  :  "  Good  rules  are  rules  which  promote  the  general 
happiness  of  those  whom  they  affect."  But  "the  greatest 
happiness  of  the  greatest  number  is  best  secured  by  laying  down 
no  rule  at  all"  (as  to  the  price  of  "labor"). 

Do  you  propose  this  as  a  sequitur  ?  for  if  not,  it  is  merely 
a  petitio  princiini^  and  a  somewhat  w^ide  one.  Before,  there- 
fore, we  branch  into  poetical  questions  concerning  happiness, 
we  will,  with  your  permission,  and  according  to  my  original 
stipulation,  that  we  should  dispute  only  of  one  point  at  a  time, 
determine  the  matters  already  -at  issue.  To  which  end,  also,  I 
leave  without  reply  some  parts  of  your  last  letter  ;  not  without 
a  little  strain  on  the  '^'pno^  oSovtodv^  for  which  I  think.  Sir, 
you  may  give  me  openly,  credit,  if  not  tacitly,  thanks, 
I  am.  Sir,  your  obliged  servant, 

JOHX    RUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  May  4. 

*  "  Yes.  But,  generally  speaking,  rules  are  beneficial ;  hence,  generally 
speaking,  justice  is  a  good  thing  in  fact.  A  state  of  society  might  be 
imagined  in  which  it  would  be  u  hideously  bad  thing." — (Foot-note  answer 
of  the  Gazette.) 


LETTEKS   OK    POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1865. 


[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  May  22, 1865.] 

WOBK  AND    WAGES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette:' 

Sir  :  I  have  long  delayed  my  reply  to  yoiir  notes  on  my 
last  letter ;  partly  being  otherwise  busy — partly  in  a  pause  of 
surprise  and  doubt  how  low  in  the  elements  of  ethics  we  were 
to  descend. 

Let  me,  however,  first  assure  you  that  I  heartily  concur  in 
your  opening  remarks,  and  shall  be  glad  to  spare  useless  and 
avoid  discourteous  w^ords.  When  you  said,  in  your  first  reply 
to  me,  that  my  letter  embodied  fallacies  which  appeared  to  you 
pernicious  in  the  highest  degree, /also  ''could  not  consider 
this  sort  of  language  well  judged."  When  you  called  one  of 
your  own  questions  an  answer,  and  declared  it  to  be  "  simple 
and  perfectly  conclusive,"  I  thought  the  flourish  might  have 
been  spared ;  and  for  having  accused  you  of  writing  carelessly, 
I  must  hope  your  pardon ;  for  the  discourtesy,  in  my  mind, 
Avould  have  been  in  imagining  you  to  be  writing  with  care. 

For  instance,  I  should  hold  it  discourteous  to  suppose  you 
unaware  of  the  ordinary  distinction  betw^een  law  and  equity : 
yet  no  consciousness  of  such  a  distinction  appears  in  your 
articles.  I  should  hold  it  discourteous  to  doubt  your  acquaint- 
ance with  the  elementary  principles  laid  down  by  the  great 
jurists  of  all  nations  respecting  Divine  and  Human  law ;  yet 
such  a  doubt  forces  itself  on  me  if  I  consider  your  replies  as 
deliberate.  And  I  should  decline  to  continue  the  discussion 
with  an  opponent  who  could  conceive  of  justice  as  (under  any 
circumstances)  ''  an  hideously  bad  thing,"  if  I  did  not  suppose 
him  to  have  mistaken  the  hideousness  of  justice,  in  certain 
phases,  to  certain  persons,  for  its  ultimate  nature  and  power. 

There  may  be  question  respecting  these  inaccuracies  of 
thouglit '  tliere   can  be  none   respecting   the   carelessness  of 


1865.]  '  WORK   AND    WAGES.  63 

expression  which  causes  the  phrases  ''  are"  and  "  ought  to  be" 
to  alternate  in  your  articles  as  if  they  were  alike  in  meaning. 

i  have  permitted  this,  that  I  miglit  see  the  course  of  your 
argument  in  vour  own  terms,  but  it  is  now  needful  that  the 
confusion  should  cease.  That  wages  are  determined  by  supply 
and  demand  is  no  proof  that  under  any  circumstances  they 
must  be — still  less  that  under  all  circumstances  they  ought  to 
be.  Permit  me,  therefore,  to  know  the  sense  in  which  you 
use  the  word  ''  ought "  in  your  paragraph  lettered  J,  page  832* 
(second  column),  and  to  ask  whether  the  words  "due,"  "duty," 
"devoir,"  and  other  such,  connected  in  idea  with  the  first  and 
third  of  the  "  prrecepta  juris"  of  Justinian,  quoted  by  Black- 
stone  as  a  summary  of  the  whole  doctrine  of  law  {honeste 
vivere^ — alter um  noii  Imlere^ — suicmqve  cuique  trihuere)^  are 
without  meaning  to  you  except  as  conditions  of  agreement  ?  f 
Whether,  in  fact,  there  be,  in  your  \'iew,  any  hono^^  absolutely  ; 
or  whether  we  are  to  launch  out  into  an  historical  investigation 
of  the  several  kinds  of  happiness  enjoyed  in  lives  of  rapine,  of 
selfish  trade,  and  of  unselfish  citizenship,  and  to  decide  only 
upon  evidence  whether  we  will  live  as  pirates,  as  pedlers,  or  as 
gentlemen  i  If  so,  while  I  shall  be  glad  to  see  you  undertake, 
independently,  so  interesting  an  inquiry,  I  must  reserve  my 
comments  on  it  until  its  close. 

But  if  you  admit  an  absolute  idea  of  a  "  devoir "  of  one 
man  to  another,  and  of  every  honorable  man  to  himself,  teU 
me  why  you  dissent  from  my  statement  of  the  terms  of  that 
debt  in  the  opening  of  this  discussion.  Observe,  I  asked  for 
no  evangelical  virtue  of  returning  good  for  evil :  I  asked  only 
for  the  Sinaitic  equity  of  return  in  good  for  good,  as  for  Sinaitic 
equity  of  return  in  evil  for  evil.     "  Eye  for  eye,"  "  tooth  for 

*  Viz.,  "Wages  ought  to  be  proportioned  to  the  supply  and  demand  of 
labor  and  capital,  and  not  to  the  hardship  of  the  work  and  the  time  spent 
on  it." 

t  "Justitia  est  constans  et  perpetua  voluntas  suum  cuique  tribuendi 
....  Jurisprudcntia  est  divinarum  atquc  humanarum  rerum  notitia,  justi 
atque  injusti  scientia."  The  third  precept  is  given  above.  Justinian, 
"Inst."  i.  1-3;  and  see  Blackstone,  vol.  i.  sectiou  2,  "Of  the  Nature  of 
Laws  in  General." 


Gi  LETTERS   OX    POLITICAL    ECOXOMY.  .  [1865. 

tooth" — be  it  so  ;  but  will  you  thus  pray  according  to  the  lex 
talionis  and  not  according  to  the  lex  gratice  f  Your  debt  is  on 
both  sides.  Does  a  man  take  of  your  life,  you  take  also  of  his. 
Shall  he  give  you  of  his  life,  and  will  you  not  give  him  also  of 
yours  ?  If  this  be  not  your  law  of  duty  to  him,  tell  me  what 
other  there  is,  or  if  you  verily  believe  there  is  none. 

But  you  ask  of  such  repayment,  "Who  shall  determine 
how  much  ?"  *  I  took  no  notice  of  the  question,  irrelevant 
when  you  asked  it ;  but  in  its  broad  bearing  it  is  the  one 
imperative  question  of  national  economy.  Of  old,  as  at  bridge- 
foot  of  Florence,  men  regulated  their  revenge  by  the  law  of 
demand  and  supply,  and  asked  in  measureless  anger,  "Who 
shall  determine  how  much  ?"  with  economy  of  blood,  such  as 
we  know.  That  "much"  is  now,  with  some  approximate 
equity,  determined  at  the  judgment-seat,  but  for  the  other 
debt,  the  debt  of  love,  we  have  no  law  but  that  of  the  wolf,  and 
the  locust,  and  the  "  fishes  of  the  sea,  which  have  no  ruler  over 
them."  The  workmen  of  England — of  the  world,  ask  for  the 
return — as  of  w^rath,  so  of  reward  by  law ;  and  for  blood  reso- 
lutely spent,  as  for  that  recklessly  shed;  for  life  devoted 
through  its  duration,  as  for  that  untimely  cast  away;  they 
require  from  you  to  determine,  in  judgment,  the  equities  of 
''Human  Retribution." 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  EuSKIN.f 
May  20,  1865. 

*  See  ante,  second  interpolation  of  tlie  Gazette,  on  p.  54. 

f  The  discussion  was  not  continued  beyond  this  letter,  the  Oazette 
judging  any  continuance  useless,  the  difference  between  Mr.  Ruskin  and 
themselves  being  "one  of  first  principles." 


1867.J  THE    STAXDAIiD    Of    WAGES.  G5 


[From  "The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  May  1, 18«7.    Reprinted  also,  with  slight  alterations, 
in  "  Time  and  Tide,"  App.  vii.) 


TJIE  STANDARD   OF   WAGES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette:' 

Sir  :  In  the  course  of  jour  yesterday's  article  on  strikes  * 
you  liave  very  neatly  and  tei*sely  expressed  the  primal  fallacy 
of  modern  political  economy — to  wit,  that  the  value  of  any 
piece  of  labor  cannot  be  detined ;  and  that  *'  all  that  can  be 
ascertained  is  simply  whether  any  man  can  be  got  to  do  it  for 
a  certain  sum.'- 

Now,  Sir,  the  ''  value''  of  any  piece  of  labor  (/should  have 
written  "  price,"  not  "  value,''  but  it  is  no  matter) — that  is  to 
say,  the  quantity  of  food  and  air  which  will  enable  a  man  to 
perform  it  without  eventually  losing  any  of  his  tiesh  or  nervous 
energy,  is  as  absolutely  fixed  a  quantity  as  the  weight  of  powder 
necessary  to  carry  a  given  ball  a  given  distance.  And  within 
limits  varying  by  exceedingly  minor  and  unimportant  circum- 
stances, it  is  an  ascertainable  quantity.  1  told  the  public  this 
five  years  ago,  and — under  pardon  of  your  politico-economical 
contributor,  it  is  not  a  sentimental,  but  a  chemical,  fact.  Let 
any  half-dozen  London  physicians  of  recognized  standing  state 
in  precise  terms  the  quantity  and  kind  of  food,  and  space  of 
lodging,  they  consider  approximately  necessary  for  the  healthy 
life  of  a  laborer  in  any  given  manufacture,  and  the  number  of 

"  As  regards  "strikes,"  it  is  of  interest  to  note  the  following  amend 
nient  proposed  by  Mr.  Ruskin  at  a  special  meeting  of  the  National 
Association  for  the  Promotion  of  Social  Science  on  the  subject,  held  in 
1868:  "  That,  in  the  opinion  of  this  meeting,  the  interests  of  workmen  and 
their  employers  are  at  present  opposed,  and  can  only  become  identical  when 
all  are  equally  employed  in  defined  labor  and  recognized  duty,  and  all, 
from  the  highest  to  the  lowest,  are  paid  fixed  salaries,  proportioned  to  the 
value  of  their  services  and  sufficient  for  their  honorable  maintenance  in 
the  situations  of  life  properly  occupied  by  them." — Diiily  Telegraph,  .July 
16,  1868. 


66  LETTERS    ON    POLITICAL   ECOKOMY.  [1873. 

hours  lie  may,  without  shortening  his  life,  work  at  such  busi- 
ness daily,  if  in  such  manner  he  be  sustained.  Let  all  masters 
be  bound  to  give  their  men  a  choice  between  an  order  for  that 
quantity  of  food  and  space  of  lodging,  or  the  market  wages  for 
that  specified  number  of  hours  of  work.  Proper  laws  for  the 
maintenance  of  families  would  require  further  concession  ;  but 
in  the  outset,  let  but  this  law  of  wages  be  established,  and  if 
tlien  we  have  more  strikes,  you  may  denounce  them  without 
one  word  of  remonstrance  either  from  sense  or  sensibility. 
I  am,  Sir,  with  sentiments  of  great  respect, 
Your  faithful  servant, 

John  Ruskin. 
Denmark  Hill,  April  30,  1867. 


[From  "The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  January  24,  1873.] 

HOW  THE  RICH  SPEND    THEIR  MONET. 
To  the  Editor  of  ''The  Pall  Mall  Gazette:' 

Sir:  Here  among  the  hills,  I  read  little,  and  withstand, 
sometimes  for  a  fortnight  together,  even  the  attractions  of  my 
Pall  Mall  Gazette.  A  friend,  however,  sent  me,  two  days 
ago,  your  article  signed  W.  R.  Gr.  on  spending  of  money 
(January  13),*  which,  as  I  happened  to  have  over-eaten  myself 
the  day  before,  and  taken  perhaps  a  glass  too  much  besides  of 
quite  priceless  port  (Quarles  Harris,  twenty  years  in  bottle), 

*  The  article,  or  rather  letter,  dealt  with  a  paper  on  "The  Labor  Move- 
ment "  by  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  in  the  Contemporary  Revieic  of  December, 
1872,  and  especially  with  the  following  sentences  in  it :  "  When  did 
wealth  rear  such  enchanted  pahices  of  luxury  as  it  is  rearing  in  England  at 
the  present  day  ?  Well  do  I  remember  one  of  those  palaces,  the  most  con- 
spicuous object  for  miles  round.  Its  lord  was,  I  dare  say,  consuming  the 
income  of  some  hundreds  of  the  poor  laboring  families  around  him.  The 
thought  that  you  are  spending  on  yourself  annually  the  income  of  six  hun- 
dred laboring  families  seems  to  me  as  much  as  a  man  with  a  heart  and  a 
brain  can  bear."  W.  R  G.'s  letter  argued  that  this  "  heartless  expenditure 
all  goes  into  the  pockets"  of  the  poor  families,  who  are  thus  benefited  by 
the  selfish  luxuries  of  the  lord  in  his  palace. 


1873.]  HOW  THE    RICH    SPEND   THEIR   MOKEY.  6t 

would  have  been  a  great  coiafort  to  my  mind,  showing  me  that 
if  I  had  done  some  harm  to  myself,  I  had  at  least  conferred 
benefit  upon  the  poor  by  tliese  excesses,  had  I  not  been  left  in 
some  painful  doubt,  even  at  the  end  of  W.  R.  G.'s  most  intel- 
ligent illustrations,  whether  I  ought  nut  to  have  exerted  myself 
further  in  the  cause  of  humanity,  and  by  the  use  of  some 
catliartic  process,  such  as  appears  to  have  been  without  incon- 
venience practised  by  the  ancients,  enabled  myself  to  eat  two 
dinners  instead  of  one.  But  I  write  to  you  to-day,  because  if 
I  were  a  poor  man,  instead  of  a  (moderately)  rich  one,  I  am 
nearly  certain  that  W.  R.  G.'s  paper  would  suggest  to  me  a 
question,  which  I  am  sure  he  will  kindly  answer  in  your 
columns,  namely,  "  These  means  of  living,  which  this  generous 
and  useful  gentleman  is  so  fortunately  disposed  to  bestow  on 
me — where  does  he  get  them  himself  f 

I  am.  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  RusKix. 
Brantwood,  Coniston,  Jan.  23. 


[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  January  29, 1873.] 

HOW  rilE  RICH  SPEND   THEIR  MONEY. 

To  tlie  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  am  disappointed  of  my  Gazette  to-day,  and  shall  be 
gi'ievously  busy  to-morrow.  I  think  it  better,  therefore,  to 
follow  up  my  own  letter,  if  you  will  permit  me,  with  a  simple 
and  brief  statement  of  the  facts,  than  to  wait  till  I  see  your 
correspondent  W.  R.  G.'s  reply,  if  he  has  vouchsafed  me  one. 

These  are  the  facts.  The  laborious  poor  produce  "the 
means  of  life"  by  their  labor.  Rich  persons  possess  themselves 
by  various  expedients  of  a  right  to  dispense  these  "  means  of 
life,"  and  keeping  as  much  means  as  they  want  of  it  for  them- 
selves, and  rather  more,  dispense  the  rest,  usually  only  in  return 
for  more  labor  from  the  poor,  expended  in  producing  various 


68  LETTEES   ON    POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1878. 

delights  for  the  rich  dispenser.  The  idea  is  now  gradually 
entering  poor  men's  minds,  that  they  may  as  well  keep  in  their 
own  hands  the  right  of  distributing  "  the  means  of  life''  they 
produce ;  and  employ  themselves,  so  far  as  they  need  extra 
occupation,  for  their  own  entertainment  or  benefit,  rather  than 
that  of  other  people.  There  is  something  to  be  said,  neverthe- 
less, in  favor  of  the  present  arrangement,  but  it  cannot  be 
defended  in  disguise ;  and  it  is  impossible  to  do  more  harm  to 
the  cause  of  order,  or  the  rights  of  property,  than  by  endeavors, 
such  as  that  of  your  correspondent,  to  revive  the  absurd  and, 
among  all  vigorous  thinkers,  long  since  exploded  notion  of  the 
dependence  of  the  poor  upon  the  rich. 

I  am.  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.  EUSKIN. 

January  28. 


[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  January  31,  1873.] 

HOW  THE  RICH  SPEND   THEIR  MONEY. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  GazetU." 

Sir  :  I  have  my  Pall  Mall  Gazette  of  the  28th  to-day,  and 
must  at  once,  with  your  permission,  solemnly  deny  the  insidi- 
osity  of  my  question,  "  Where  does  the  rich  man  get  his  means 
of  living  ?"  I  don't  myself  see  how  a  more  straigiit forward 
question  could  be  put !  So  straightforward  indeed  that  I 
particularly  dislike  making  a  martyr  of  myself  in  answering 
it,  as  I  must  this  blessed  day — a  martyr,  at  least,  in  the  way 
of  witness ;  for  if  we  rich  people  don't  begin  to  speak  honestly 
with  our  tongues,  we  shall,  some  day  soon,  lose  them  and  our 
heads  together,  having  for  some  time  back,  most  of  us,  made 
false  use  of  the  one  and  none  of  the  other.  Well,  for  the 
point  in  question  then,  as  to  means  of  living :  the  most  exem- 
plary manner  of  answer  is  simply  to  state  how  I  got  my 
own,  or  rather  how  my  father  got  them  for  me.  He  and  his 
partners  entered  into  what  your   correspondent  mellifluously 


1873.]  HOW    THE    RICH    SPEXD    THEIR    MONEY.  69 

styles  "  a  mutually  beneficent  partnersliip,"'-  with  certain 
laborers  in  Spain.  These  laborers  produced  from  the  earth 
annually  a  certain  number  of  bottles  of  wine.  These  produc- 
tions were  sold  by  my  father  and  his  partners,  who  kept  nine- 
tenths,  or  thereabouts,  of  the  price  themselves,  and  gave 
one-tenth,  or  thereabouts,  to  the  laborers.  In  which  state  of 
mutual  benelicence  my  father  and  his  partners  naturally  became 
rich,  and  the  laborers  as  naturally  remained  poor.  Then  my 
good  father  gave  all  his  money  to  me  (who  never  did  a  stroke 
of  work  in  my  life  worth  my  salt,  not  to  mention  my  dinner), 
and  so  far  from  finding  his  money  ''grow"  in  my  hands,  I 
never  try  to  buy  anything  with  it ;  but  people  tell  me  "  money 
isn't  what  it  was  in  your  father's  time,  everything  is  so  much 
dearer."  I  should  be  heartily  glad  to  learn  fi'om  your  corre- 
spondent as  much  pecuniary  botany  as  will  enable  me  to  set 
my  money  a-growing ;  and  in  the  mean  time,  as  I  have  thus 
given  a  quite  indubitable  instance  of  my  notions  of  the  way 
money  is  made,  will  he  be  so  kind  as  to  give  us,  not  an  heraldic 
example  in  the  dark  ages  (though  I  suspect  I  know  more  of  the 
pedigree  of  money,  if  he  comes  to  that,  than  he  does),t  but  a 
living  example  of  a  rich  gentleman  who  has  made  his  money 
l)y  saving  an  equal  portion  of  profit  in  some  mutually  beneficent 
partnership  with  his  laborers  ? 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.    RUSKIN. 
Brantwood,  Coniston, 

King  Charles  the  Martyr,  1873. 

P.S.— I   see  by  Christie  &  Manson's   advertisement   that 

*  W.  R.  G.  had  declared  that  the  rich  man  (or  his  ancestors)  got  the 
money  "by  co-operation  with  the  poor  ...  by,  in  fact,  entering  into  a 
mutually  beneficent  partnership  with  them,  and  advancing  them  their  share 
of  the  joint  profits  .  .  .  paying  them  beforehand,  in  a  word." 

f  W.  R.  G.  had  written:  "In  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  in  the  ca.se  of  acquired 
wealth,  we  should  probably  find,  were  the  pedigi-ee  traced  fairly  and  far 
back  enough,  that  the  original  difference  between  the  now  rich  man  and 
the  now  poor  man  was,  that  the  latter  habitually  spent  all  his  earnings,  and 
the  former  habitually  saved  a  portion  of  his  in  order  that  it  might  accumu- 
late and  fructify." 


70  LETTERS   ON    POLITICAL   ECOKOMY.  [1873. 

some  of  tlie  best  bits  of  work  of  a  good  laborer  I  once  knew, 
J.  M.  W.  Turner  (the  original  plates  namely  of  the  "  Liber 
Stiidiorum"),  are  just  going  to  be  destroyed  by  some  of  his 
affectionate  relations.  May  I  beg  your  correspondent  to 
explain,  for  your  readers'  benefit,  this  charming  case  of  hered- 
itary accumulation  ? 


[Date  and  place  of  publication  unknown.] 
COMMERCIAL  MORALITY* 


My  dear  Sir  :  Mr.  Johnson's  speech  in  the  Manchester 
Chamber  of  Commerce,  which  you  favor  me  by  sending, 
appears  to  me  the  most  important  event  that  has  occurred  in 
relation  to  the  true  interests  of  the  country  during  my  lifetime. 
It  begins  an  era  of  true  civilization.  I  shall  allude  to  it  in  the 
"  Fors"  of  March,  and  make  it  the  chief  subject  of  the  one 
following  (the  matter  of  this  being  already  prepared). f  It 
goes  far  beyond  what  I  had  even  hoped  to  hear  admitted — 
how  much  less  enforced  so  gravely  and  weightily  in  the  com- 
mercial world. 

Believe  me,  faithfully  yours, 

J.    EUSKIN. 

*  This  letter  was  received  from  Mr.  Ruskin  by  a  gentleman  in  Man- 
chester, who  had  forwarded  to  him  a  copy  of  the  speech  made  by  Mr. 
Richard  Johnson  (President)  at  the  fifty-fourth  annual  meeting  of  the 
^Manchester  Chamber  of  Commerce,  Feb.  1,  1875.  Mr.  Johnson's  address 
dealt  with  the  immorality  of  cheapness,  the  duties  of  merchants  and  manu- 
facturers as  public  servants,  and  the  nobility  of  trade  as  a  profession  which, 
when  rightly  and  unselfishly  conducted,  would  yield  to  no  other  "in  the 
dignity  of  its  nature  and  in  the  employment  that  it  offers  to  the  highest 
faculties  of  man." 

f  In  "  Fors  Clavigera,"  March,  1875,  Mr.  Johnson's  speech  is  named  (p. 
54)  as  "the  first  living  words  respecting  commerce  which  I  have  ever 
known  to  be  spoken  in  England,  in  my  time,"  but  the  discussion  of  it  is 
postponed. 


1877.]  THE    PRINCIPLES   OF   PROPERTY.  71 

[From  "  The  Monetary  ami  Mining  Gazette,"  November  13,  1875.] 

TUE  DEFINITION  OF  WEALTH. 

Corpus  Ciikisti  College,  Oxford, 

9^A  Nocembcr,  1875. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  i?ie  Monetary  Gazette:' 

Sir:  I  congratulate  you  with  all  my  mind  on  the  sense,  and 
with  all  my  heart  on  the  courage,  of  your  last  Saturday's  leading 
article,  which  I  have  just  seen.*  You  have  asserted  in  it  the 
two  vital  principles  of  economy,  that  society  cannot  exist  by 
i-eciprocal  pilfering,  but  must  produce  wealth  if  it  would  have 
it ;  and  that  money  must  not  be  lent,  but  administered  by  its 
masters. 

You  have  not  yet,  however,  defined  wealth  itself,  or  told 
the  ingenuity  of  the  public  what  it  is  to  produce. 

I  have  never  been  able  to  obtain  this  definition  from 
economists  ;t  perhaps,  under  the  pressure  of  facts,  they  may 
at  last  discover  some  meaning  in  mine  at  the  tenth  and  eleventh 
pages  of  "  Munera  Pulveris." 

1  am.  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.    KUSKIN. 


[From  "The  Socialist,"  an  Advocate  of  Love,  Truth,  Justice,  etc.  etc.  Printed  and 
Published  by  the  Proprietor,  W.  Freeland,  52  Scotland  Street,  Sheffield,  November. 
1877.] 

THE  PRINCIPLES    OF  PROPERTY. 

\m  Oct.,  1877. 
To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Social." 

Sir:  Some    Shefiield    friend   has   sent   me    your   fourth 
number,  in  the  general  teaching  of  which  I  am  thankful  to 

*  The  article  was  entitled,  "  What  shall  we  do  with  it?" 
f  At  the  meeting  of  the  Social  Science  Association  already  alluded  to  (p. 
4,  note),  Mr.  Ruskin  said  that  in  1858  he  had  in  vain  challenged  Mr.  Mill 
to  define  wealth.  The  passages  referred  to  in  "  Muucra  Pulveris"  consist 
of  the  statement  and  explanation  of  the  definition  of  Value.  See  ante,  p. 
63,  note. 


72  LETTERS   ON    POLITICAL   ECONOMY.  [1877. 

be  able  to  concur  without  qualification :  but  let  me  earnestly 
beg  of  you  not  to  confuse  the  discussion  of  the  principles  of 
Property  in  Earth,  Air,  or  Water,  with  the  discussion  of 
principles  of  Property  in  general.^  The  things  which,  being 
our  neighbor's,  the  Mosaic  Law  commands  us  not  to  covet,  are 
by  the  most  solemn  Natural  Laws,  indeed  our  neighbor's 
"  property,"  and  any  attempts  to  communize  these  have 
always  ended,  and  will  always  end,  in  ruin  and  shame. 

'  Do  not  attempt  to  learn  from  America.  An  Englishman 
has  brains  enough  to  discover  for  himself  wliat  is  good  for 
England ;  and  should  learn,  when  he  is  to  be  taught  anything, 
from  his  Fathers,  not  from  his  children.  _ 

I  observe  in  the  first  column  of  your  15tli  page  the  asser- 
tion by  your  correspondent  of  his  definition  of  money  as  if 
different  from  mine.  He  only  weakens  my  definition  with  a 
''  certificate  of  credit "  instead  of  a  "  promise  to  pay."  What 
is  the  use  of  giving  a  man  "  credit " — if  you  don't  engage 
to  pay  him  ? 

But  I  observe  that  nearly  all  my  readers  stop  at  this  more 
or  less  metaphysical  definition,  which  I  give  in  "  Unto  this 
Last,"  instead  of  going  on  to  the  practical  statement  of  imme- 
diate need  made  in  "  Munera  Pulveris."  f 

The  promise  to  find  Labor  is  one  which  meets  general 
demand ;  but  the  promise  to  find  Bread  is  the  answer  needed 
to  immediate  demand ;  and  the  only  sound  bases  of  National 
Currency  are  shown  both  in  "Munera  Pulveris,"  and  "  Fors 
Clavigera,"  to  be  bread,  fuel,  and  clothing  material,  of  cer- 
tified quality. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  KUSKIN. 


*  The  references  in  the  letter  are  to  an  article  on  Property  entitled 
"What  should  be  done?" 

f  See  "Unto  this  Last,"  p.  53,  note.  "The  final  and  best  definition 
of  money  is  that  it  is  a  documentary  promise  ratified  and  guaranteed  l\y 
the  nation,  to  give  or  find  a  certain  quantity  of  labor  on  demand."  See 
also  "Munera  Pulveris,"  ^S  21-25. 


1880.]  ON    CO-OPERATION.  73 


[From  "  The  Christian  Life,"  December  20, 1879.] 

ON   COOPERATION* 

Brantwood,  Coniston,  Lancashire. 

Dear  Mr.  Holyoake  :  I  am  not  able  to  write  you  a  pretty 
letter  to-day,  being  sadly  tired,  but  am  very  heartily  glad  to 
be  remembered  by  you.  But  it  utterly  silences  me  that  you 
should  waste  your  time  and  energy  in  writing  '*  Histories  of 
Co-operation"  anywhere  as  yet.  My  dear  Sir,  you  might  as 
well  write  the  history  of  the  yellow  spot  in  an  egg — in  two 
volumes.  Co-operation  is  as  yet — in  any  true  sense — as  impos- 
sible as  the  crystallization  of  Thames  mud. 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

J.  RusKm. 


[From  "The  Daily  News,"  June  19,  1880.] 
ON  CO-OPERATION 


Brantwood,  Coniston,  Lancashire, 

April  12,  1880. 

Dear  Mr.  Holyoake  :  I  am  very  glad  that  you  are  safe 
back  in  England,  and  am  not  a  little  grateful  for  your  kind 
reference  to  me  while  in  America,  and  for  your  letter  about 
Sheffield  Museum.-f     But  let  me  pray  for  another  interpreta- 

*  Tills  letter,  whicli  was  reprinted  in  tlie  Coventry  Co-operative  Recmd  of 
January,  1880,  was  written,  some  time  in  August,  1879,  to  Mr.  George  Jacob 
Holyoake,  whio  liad  sent  Mr.  Ruskin  liis  "History  of  Co-operation:  its 
Literature  and  its  Advocates,"  2  vols.     Loudon  and  Manchester.  1875-7. 

f  The  "kind  reference  to  Mr.  Ruskin  while  in  America"  alludes  to  a 
public  speech  made  by  ^Ir.  Holyoake  during  his  stay  in  that  country. 
The  "letter  about  Sheffield  >[useum,"  was  one  in  high  praise  of  it,  written 
by  Mr.  Holyoake  to  the  editor  of  the  Sheffield  Independent,  ia  which  paper 
it  was  printed  (March  8,  1880). 


74  LETTERS   OK   POLITICAL  ECOKOMY.  [1880. 

tion  of  my  former  letter  than  mere  Utopianism.  The  one 
calamity  which  I  perceive  or  dread  for  an  Englishman  is  his 
becoming  a  rascal,  and  co-operation  among  rascals — if  it  were 
possible — would  bring  a  curse.  Every  year  sees  our  workmen 
more  eager  to  do  bad  work  and  rob  their  customers  on  the  sly. 
All  political  movement  among  such  animals  I  call  essentially 
fermentation  and  putrefaction — not  co-operation. 

Ever  affectionately  yours, 

J.  KUSKIN. 


MISCELLANEOUS  LETTERS. 


L  The  Management  of  Railways. 

IL  Servants  and  Houses. 

III.  Roman  Inundations. 

IV.  Education,  for  Rich  and  Poor. 

V.  Women:  Their  Work  and  their  Dress. 

VI.  Literary  Criticism. 


£    I 


MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS. 


I. 

THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   RAILWAYS. 

Is  England  Big  Enough  ?    1868. 
The  Owntership  of  Railways.     1868. 
Railway  Economy.     1868. 
OuK  Railway  System.     1865. 
Railway  S.\fety.     1870. 


I. 

THE    MANAGEMENT    OF    RAILWAYS. 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,  '  July  31,  1868.] 

JS   ENGLAND  BIG  ENOUGH? 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir  :  You  terminate  to-day  a  discussion  which  seems  to 
have  been  greatly  interesting  to  your  readers,  by  telling  them 
the  '*  broad  fact,  that  England  is  no  longer  big  enough  for  her 
inhabitants."  "'^ 

Miglit  you  not,  in  the  leisure  of  the  recess,  open  with 
advantage  a  discussion  likely  to  be  no  less  interesting,  and 
much  more  useful — namely,  how  big  England  may  be  made 
for  economical  inhabitants,  and  how  little  she  may  be  made 
for  wasteful  ones  ?  Might  you  not  invite  letters  on  this  quite 
radical  and  essential  question — how  money  is  truly  made, 
and  how  it  is  truly  lost,  not  by  one  person  or  another,  but  by 
the  whole  nation  ? 

For,  practically,  people's  eyes  are  so  intensely  fixed  on  the 
immediate  operation  of  money  as  it  changes  hands,  that  they 
hardly  ever  reflect  on  its  first  origin  or  final  disappearance. 
They  are  always  considering  how  to  get  it  from  somebody 
else,  but  never  how  to  get  it  where  that  somebody  else  got  it. 

*  The  discussion  had  been  carried  on  in  a  series  of  letters  from  a  great 
number  of  correspondents  under  the  heading  of  "Marriage  or  Celibacy," 
its  subject  being  the  pecuniary  difficulties  in  the  way  of  early  marriage. 
The  Daily  Telegraph  of  July  30  concluded  the  discussion  with  a  leading 
article,  in  which  it  characterized  the  general  nature  of  the  correspondence, 
and  of  which  the  final  words  were  those  quoted  by  Mr.  Ruskin. 


80  miscella:n^eous  letters.  [1868. 

Also,  they  very  naturally  motirn  over  their  loss  of  it  to  other 
people,  without  reflecting  that,  if  not  lost  altogether,  it  may 
still  be  of  some  reflective  advantage  to  them.  Whereas,  the 
real  national  question  is  not  who  is  losing  or  gaining  money, 
but  who  is  making  and  who  destroying  it.  I  do  not  of  course 
mean  making  money,  in  the  sense  of  printing  notes  or  finding 
gold.  True  money  cannot  be  so  made.  When  an  island  is 
too  small  for  its  inhabitants,  it  would  not  help  them  to  one 
ounce  of  bread  more  to  have  the  entire  island  turned  into  one 
nugget,  or  to  find  bank  notes  growing  by  its  rivulets  instead 
of  fern  leaves.  E'either,  by  destroying  money,  do  I  mean 
burning  notes,  or  throwing  gold  away.  If  I  burn  a  five- 
pound  note,  or  throw  five  sovereigns  into  the  sea,  I  hurt  no 
one  but  myself;  nay,  I  benefit  others,  for  everybody  with  a 
pound  in  his  pocket  is  richer  by  the  withdrawal  of  my  com- 
petition in  the  market.  But  what  I  want  you  to  make  your 
readers  discover  is  how  the  true  money  is  made  that  will  get 
them  houses  and  dinners ;  and  on  the  other  hand  how  money 
is  truly  lost,  or  so  diminished  in  value  that  all  they  can  get  in 
a  year  will  not  buy  them  comfortable  houses,  nor  satisfactory 
dinners. 

Surely  this  is  a  question  which  people  would  like  to  have 
clearly  answered  for  them,  and  it  might  lead  to  some  impor- 
tant results  if  the  answer  were  acted  upon.  The  riband- 
makers  at  Coventry,  starving,  invite  the  ladies  of  England  to 
wear  ribands.  The  compassionate  ladies  of  England  invest 
themselves  in  rainbows,  and  admiring  economists  declare  the 
nation  to  be  benefited.  No  one  asks  where  the  ladies  got 
the  money  to  spend  in  rainbows  (which  is  the  first  question  in 
the  business),  nor  whether  the  money  once  so  spent  will  ever 
return  again,  or  has  really  faded  with  the  faded  ribands  and 
disappeared  forever.  Again,  honest  people  every  day  lose 
quantities  of  money  to  dishonest  people.  But  that  is  merely 
a  change  of  hands  much  to  be  regretted ;  but  the  money  is 
not  therefore  itself  lost ;  the  dishonest  people  must  spend  it  at 
last  somehow.  A  youth  at  college  loses  his  year's  income  to  a 
Jew.      But  the  Jew  must  spend  it  instead  of  him.      Miser  or 


1868.]  LETTERS    ON    RAILWAYS.  81 

not,  the  day  must  come  wlieii  liis  hands  relax.  A  railroad 
shareholder  loses  his  money  to  a  director;  but  the  director 
must  some  day  spend  it  instead  uf  him.  That  is  not — at  least 
in  the  first  fact  of  it — natio}i(d  loss.  But  what  the  public 
need  to  know  is,  how  a  final  and  perfect  loss  of  money  takes 
place,  so  that  the  whole  nation,  instead  of  being  rich,  shall  be 
getting  gradually  poor.  And  then,  indeed,  if  one  man  in 
spending  his  money  destroys  it,  and  another  in  spending  it 
makes  more  of  it,  it  becomes  a  grave  cpiestion  in  whose  hands 
it  is,  and  whether  honest  or  dishonest  people  are  likely  to 
spend  it  to  the  best  purpose.  Will  you  permit  me.  Sir,  to  lay 
this  not  unprofitable  subject  of  inquiry  before  your  readers, 
while,  to  the  very  best  purpose,  they  are  investing  a  little 
money  in  sea  air  ? 

Yery  sincerely  yours, 

J.    KUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  July  30. 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  August  6, 1868.] 

THE  OWNERSHIP  OF  BAILWAYS* 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Daily  Telegraph:' 

Sir  :  The  ingenious  British  public  seems  to  be  discovering, 
to  its  cost,  that  the  beautiful  law  of  supply  and  demand  does 
not  apply  in  a  pleasant  manner  to  railroad  transit.  But  if 
they  are  prepared  to  submit  patiently  to  the  "  natural "  laws  of 

*  In  the  Daily  Telegraph  of  August  3  appeared  eight  letters,  all  of 
which,  under  the  heading  of  "Increased  Railway  Fares,"  complained  of 
the  price  of  tickets  on  various  lines  having  been  suddenly  raised.  In  the 
issue  of  August  4  eighteen  letters  appeared  on  the  subject,  whilst  in  that 
of  the  5th  there  were  again  eight  letters.  Mr.  Ruskin's  letter  was  one  of 
four  in  the  issue  of  the  6tli.  It  has,  it  will  be  seen,  no  direct  connection 
with  that  one  entitled  "Is  England  Big  Enough?"  which  precedes  it  in 
these  volumes  owing  to  the  allusions  to  it  in  one  of  these  railway  letters 
(p.  86). 


82  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1868. 

political  economy,  what  right  have  they  to  complain  ?  The 
railroad  belongs  to  the  shareholders ;  and  has  not  everybody  a 
right  to  ask  the  highest  price  he  can  get  for  his  wares  ?  The 
public  have  a  perfect  right  to  walk,  or  to  make  other  opposi- 
tion railroads  for  themselves,  if  they  please,  but  not  to  abuse 
the  shareholders  for  asking  as  much  as  they  think  they  can 
get. 

Will  you  allow  me  to  put  the  real  rights  of  the  matter 
before  them  in  a  few  words  ? 

Neither  the  roads  nor  the  railroads  of  any  nation  should 
belong  to  any  private  persons.  All  means  of  public  transit 
should  be  provided  at  public  expense,  by  public  determination 
where  such  means  are  needed,  and  the  public  should  be  its 
own  "  shareholder." 

Neither  road,  nor  railroad,  nor  canal  should  ever  pay  divi- 
dends to  anybody.  They  should  pay  their  working  expenses, 
and  no  more.  All  dividends  are  simply  a  tax  on  the  traveller 
and  the  goods,  levied  by  the  person  to  whom  the  road  or  canal 
belongs,  for  the  right  of  passing  over  his  property.  And  this 
right  should  at  once  be  purchased  by  the  nation,  and  the 
original  cost  of  the  roadway — be  it  of  gravel,  iron,  or  adamant 
— at  once  defrayed  by  the  nation,  and  then  the  whole  work  of 
the  carriage  of  persons  or  goods  done  for  ascertained  prices,  by 
salaried  officers,  as  the  carriage  of  letters  is  done  now. 

I  believe,  if  the  votes  of  the  proprietors  of  all  the  railroads 
in  the  kingdom  were  taken  en  viasse,  it  would  be  found  that 
the  majority  would  gladly  receive  back  their  original  capital, 
and  cede  their  right  of  '^  revising"  prices  of  railway  tickets. 
And  if  railway  property  is  a  good  and  wise  investment  of 
capital,  the  public  need  not  shrink  from  taking  the  whole  off 
tlieir  hands.  Let  the  public  take  it.  (I,  for  one,  who  never 
held  a  rag  of  railroad  scrip  in  my  life,  nor  ever  willingly  trav- 
elled behind  an  engine  where  a  horse  could  pull  me,  will  most 
gladly  subscribe  my  proper  share  for  such  purchase  according 
to  my  income.)  Then  let  them  examine  what  lines  pay  their 
working  expenses  and  what  lines  do  not,  and  boldly  leave  the 
unpaying  embankments  to   be  white   over  with   sheep,  like 


1868.]  LETTERS    ON    EAILWAYS.  83 

Eoman  camps,  take  up  the  working  lines  on  sound  principles, 
pay  their  drivers  and  pointsmen  well,  keep  their  carriages 
clean  and  in  good  repair,  and  make  it  as  wonderful  a  thing  for 
a  train,  as  for  an  old  mail-coach,  to  be  behind  its  time ;  and  the 
sagacious  British  public  will  very  soon  lind  its  puckct  heavier, 
its  heart  lighter,  and  its  ''  passages"  pleasanter,  than  any  of  the 
three  have  been,  for  many  a  day. 

I  am,  Sir,  always  faithfully  yours, 

J.  liUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Aug.  5. 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  August  10,  1868.] 

RAILWAY  ECONOMY. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph.'' 

Sir  :  I  had  not  intended  again  to  trespass  on  your  space 
until  I  could  obtain  a  general  idea  of  the  views  of  your  corre- 
spondents on  tlie  questions  you  permitted  me  to  lay  before 
them  in  my  letters  of  the  31st  July  and  5th  inst. ;  but  I  must 
ask  you  to  allow  me  to  correct  an  impression  likely  to  be 
created  by  your  reference  to  that  second  letter  in  your  inter- 
esting article  on  the  Great  Eastern  Ilailway,  and  to  reply 
briefly  to  the  question  of  your  correspondent  "  S."  on  the  same 
subject.* 

*  The  Daily  Telegraph  of  Saturday.  August  8,  contained  an  article  on 
the  "iDcreased  Railway  Fares,"  in  which,  commenting  on  Mr.  Ruskin's 
statement  that,  given  the  law  of  political  economy,  the  railways  might  ask 
as  much  as  they  could  get,  it  said  that  Mr.  Ruskin  mistook  "the  charge 
against  the  companies.  While  they  neglected  the  'law  of  supply  and 
demand,'  they  suffered:  no\v  that  they  obey  that  law,  they  prosper."  The 
latter  part  of  the  article  dealt  with  a  long  letter  signed  "Fair  Play."  which 
was  printed  in  the  Daily  Tehgraph  of  the  same  day.  "To  Mr.  Ruskin, 
who  laughs  at  Political  Economy."  concluded  the  article;  "and  to  'Fair 
Play,'  who  thinks  that  Parliament  is  at  the  l)ottom  of  all  the  mischief,  we 
commend  a  significant  fact.  An  agitation  is  now  on  foot  in  Brighton  to 
Lave  a  second  railway  direct  to  London.     What  is  the  cause  of  this?    Not 


84  ~  MISCELLANEOUS    LETTERS.  [1868. 

You  say  that  I  mistook  the  cliarge  against  the  railway  com- 
panies in  taunting  my  unfortunate  neighbors  at  Sydenham  ^ 
with  their  complaints  against  the  operation  of  the  law  of  supply 
and  demand,  and  that  it  was  because  the  companies  neglected 
that  law  that  they  suffered. 

But,  Sir,  the  law  of  supj^ly  and  demand,  as  behaved  in  by 
the  British  public  under  the  guidance  of  their  economists,  is  a 
natural  law  regulating  prices,  which  it  is  not  at  all  in  their 
option  to  ''neglect."  And  it  is  precisely  because  I  have 
always  declared  that  there  is  no  such  natural  law,  but  that 
prices  can  be,  and  ought  to  be,  regulated  by  laws  of  expediency 
and  justice,  that  political  economists  have  thought  I  did  not 
understand  their  science,  and  you  now  say  I  laugh  at  it.  'No, 
Sir,  I  laughed  only  at  what  was  clearly  no  science,  but  vain 
endeavor  to  allege  as  irresistible  natural  law^,  what  is  indeed  a 
too  easily  resisted  prudential  law,  rewarding  and  chastising  us 
according  to  our  obedience.  So  far  from  despising  true  politi- 
cal economy,  based  on  such  prudential  law,  I  have  for  years 
been  chiefly  occupied  in  defending  its  conclusions,  having 
given  this  definition  of  it  in  1862.  ''Political  Economy  is 
'neither  an  art  nor  a  science ;  but  a  system  of  conduct  and 
legislature  founded  on  the  sciences,  including  the  arts,  and 
impossible  except  under  certain  conditions  of  moral  culture."  + 

And,  Sir,  nothing  could  better  show  the  evil  of  competi- 
tion as  opposed  to  the  equitable  regulation  of  prices  than  the 
instance  to  which  you  refer  your  correspondent  "  Fair  Play" 
— the  agitation  in  Brighton  for  a  second  railway.     True  pru- 

the  Legislature,  but  the  conduct  of  the  Brighton  company  in  raising  its 
fares.  That  board,  by  acting  in  the  spirit  of  a  monopoly,  has  provoked 
retaliation,  and  the  public  now  seeks  to  protect  itself  by  tlie  aid  of  a  com- 
peting line." 

The  letter  of  the  correspondent  "  S."  (also  in  the  Daily  Telegraph  of 
August  8)  began  by  asking  "  what  the  capitalist  is  to  do  with  his  money,  if 
the  Government  works  the  railways  on  the  principle  of  the  Post  Office." 

*  Several  of  the  letters  had  been  written  by  residents  in  the  neighbor- 
hood of  Sydenham. 

f  "Essays  on  Political  Economy"  (Fmser's  Mar/azine,  June,  1862,  p. 
784),  now  reprinted  in  "  Munera  Pulvcris,"  p.  1,  §  1. 


1868.]  LETTERS   OX    RAILWAYS.  85 

deiitial  law  would  make  one  railway  serve  it  thoroughly,  and 
Hx  tlie  fares  necessary  to  pay  for  thorough  service.  Competi- 
tion will  make  two  railways  (sinking  twice  the  capital  really 
recjuiredj ;  then,  if  the  two  companies  combine,  they  can 
oppress  the  public  as  elfectively  as  one  could  ;  if  they  do  not, 
they  will  keej)  the  said  public  in  dirty  carriages  and  in  danger 
of  its  life,  by  lowering  the  working  expenses  to  a  mininnim  in 
their  antagonism. 

Xext,  to  the  question  of  your  correspondent  "S.,"  ''  what  I 
expect  the  capitalist  to  do  with  his  money,"  so  far  as  it  is  asked 
in  good  faith  I  gladly  reply,  that  no  one's  "  expectations"  are 
in  this  matter  of  the  slightest  consequence  ;  but  that  the  moral 
laws  which  properly  regulate  the  disposition  of  revenue,  and 
the  physical  laws  which  determine  returns  proportioned  to  the 
wisdom  of  its  employment,  are  of  the  greatest  consequence; 
and  these  may  be  briefly  stated  as  follows : 

1.  All  capital  is  justly  and  rationally  invested  which  sup- 
ports productive  labor  (that  is  to  say,  labor  directly  producing 
or  distributing  good  food,  clothes,  lodging,  or  fuel) ;  so  long  as 
it  renders  to  the  possessor  of  the  capital,  and  to  those  whom  he 
employs,  only  such  gain  as  shall  justly  remunerate  the  super- 
intendence and  labor  given  to  the  business,  and  maintain  both 
master  and  operative  happily  in  the  positions  of  life  involved 
by  their  several  functions.  And  it  is  highly  advantageous  for 
the  nation  that  wise  superintendence  and  honest  labor  should 
both  be  highly  rewarded.  But  all  rates  of  interest  or  modes  of 
profit  on  capital,  which  render  possible  the  rapid  accumulation 
of  fortunes,  are  simply  forms  of  taxation,  by  individuals,  on 
lal)or,  purchase,  or  transport ;  and  are  highly  detrimental  to 
the  national  interests,  being,  indeed,  no  means  of  national  gain, 
but  only  the  abstraction  of  small  gains  from  many  to  form  the 
large  gain  of  one.  For,  though  inequality  of  fortune  is  not  in 
itself  an  evil,  but  in  many  respects  desirable,  it  is  always  an 
evil  when  unjustly  or  stealthily  obtained,  since  the  men  who 
desire  to  make  fortunes  by  large  interest  are  precisely  those 
who  will  make  the  worst  use  of  their  wealth. 

2.  Capital  sunk  in  the  production  of  objects  which  do  not 


86  MlSCELLANEOlb    LETTEKS.  [1868. 

immediately  support  life  (as  statues,  pictures,  architecture, 
books,  garden-flowers,  and  the  like)  is  benelicially  sunk  if  the 
things  thus  produced  are  good  of  their  kind,  and  honestly 
desired  by  the  nation  for  their  own  sake  ;  but  it  is  sunk  ruin- 
ously if  they  are  bad  of  their  kind,  or  desired  only  for  pride  or 
gain.  Neither  can  good  art  be  produced  as  an  "  investment." 
You  cannot  build  a  good  cathedral  if  you  only  build  it  that  you 
may  charge  sixpence  for  entrance. 

3.  "  Private  enterprise"  should  never  be  interfered  ^vith, 
but,  on  the  contrary,  much  encouraged,  so  long  as  it  is  indeed 
"  enterprise"  (the  exercise  of  individual  ingenuity  and  audacity 
in  new  fields  of  true  labor),  and  so  long  as  it  is  indeed  "  pri- 
vate," paying  its  way  at  its  own  cost,  and  in  no  wise  harmfully 
affecting  public  comforts  or  interests.  But  "  private  enter- 
prise" w^hich  poisons  its  neighborhood,  or  speculates  for  indi- 
vidual gain  at  connnon  risk,  is  very  shar|)ly  to  be  interfered 
with. 

4.  All  enterprise,  constantly  and  demonstrably  profitable 
on  ascertained  conditions,  should  be  made  public  enterprise, 
under  Government  administration  and  security  ;  and  the  funds 
now  innocently  contiibuted,  and  too  often  far  from  innocently 
absorbed,  in  vain  speculation,  as  noted  in  your  correspondent 
^'  Fair  Play's"  excellent  letter,*  ought  to  be  received  by  Gov- 
ernment, employed  by  it,  not  in  casting  guns,  but  in  grownng 
corn  and  feeding  cattle,  and  the  largest  possible  legitimate 
interest  returned  without  risk  to  these  small  and  variously  occu- 
pied capitalists,  who  cannot  look  after  their  own  money. 
We  should  need  another  kind  of  Government  to  do  this  for 
us,  it  is  true ;  also  it  is  true  that  we  can  get  it,  if  we  choose ; 
but  we  must  recognize  the  duties  of  governors  before  we  can 
elect  the  men  fit  to  perform  them. 

The  benefit  of  these  several  modes  of  right  investment  of 
capital  would  be  quickly  felt  by  the  nation,  not  in  the  increase 
of  isolated  or  nominal  wealth,  but  in  steady  lowering  of  the 

*  "Fair  Play's"  letter  noted  the  result  of  investments  made  in  bubble 
railways,  generally  by  "honest  country  folks"  or  "  poor  clergymen  and 
widows." 


1868.]  LErrERS  ox  railways.  87 

prices  of  all  the  necessaries  and  innocent  luxuries  of  life,  and 
in  the  disciplined,  orderly,  and  in  that  degree  educational 
employment  of  every  able-bodied  person.  For,  Sir  (again  with 
your  pardon),  my  question  ''Is  England  big  enough?"  was 
not  answered  by  the  sad  experience  of  the  artisans  of  Poplar. 
Had  they  been  employed  in  earthbuilding  instead  of  in  shii)- 
building,  and  heaped  the  Isle  of  Dogs  itself  into  half  as  much 
space  of  good  land,  capable  of  growing  corn  instead  uf  musqui- 
toes,  they  would  actually  have  made  habitable  England  a  little 
bigger  by  this  time;*  and  if  the  first  principle  of  economy  in 
employment  were  understood  among  us — namely,  always  to 
use  whatever  vital  power  of  breath  and  muscle  you  have  got  in 
the  country  before  you  use  the  artificial  power  of  steam  and 
iron  for  what  living  arms  can  do,  and  never  plough  by  steam 
while  you  forward  your  ploughman  to  Quebec — those  old 
familiar  faces  need  not  yet  have  looked  their  last  at  each  other 
from  the  deck  of  the  St.  Lawrence.  But  on  this  subject  I  will 
ask  your  permission  to  write  you  in  a  few  days  some  further 
words,  t 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    RUSKIN. 
Denmark  Hill,  Aug.  9. 

*  Alluding  to  an  article  in  the  Daily  Telegraph  of  August  8,  headed 
"East-End  Emigrants,"  which,  after  remarking  that  "Mr.  Ruskin's  ques- 
tion, Is  England  big  enough?"  had  been  just  answered  rather  sadly  by  a 
number  of  Poplar  artisans,  described  the  emigration  to  Quebec  on  board 
the  St.  Lawrence  of  tbese  inhabitants  of  the  Isle  of  Dogs,  and  how,  as  the 
ship  left  the  dock,  "there  were  many  tears  shed,  as  old,  familiar  faces 
looked  on  each  other  for  the  last  time." 

f  Never,  it  seems,  written. 


88  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTEfiS.  [1865. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  December  8,  1865.] 

OUR   RAILWAY  SYSTEM. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir  :  Will  joii  allow  me  a  few  words  with  reference  to  your 
excellent  article  of  to-day  on  railroads."^  All  yon  say  is  true.  But 
of  what  use  is  it  to  tell  the  public  this  ?  Of  all  the  economical 
stupidities  of  the  public — and  they  are  many — the  out-and-out 
stupidest  is  underpaying  their  pointsmen  ;  but  if  the  said  public 
choose  always  to  leave  their  lines  in  the  hands  of  companies — 
that  is  to  say,  practically,  of  engineers  and  lawyers — the  money 
they  pay  for  fares  will  always  go,  most  of  it,  into  the  engineers' 
and  lawyers'  pockets.  It  will  be  spent  in  decorating  railroad 
stations  with  black  and  blue  bricks,  and  in  fighting  bills  for 
branch  lines.  I  hear  there  are  more  bills  for  new  lines  to  be 
brought  forward  this  year  than  at  any  previous  session.  But, 
Sir,  it  might  do  some  little  good  if  you  were  to  put  it  into  the 
engineers'  and  law^yers'  heads  that  they  might  for  some  time  to 
come  get  as  much  money  for  themselves  (and  a  little  more  safety 
for  the  public)  by  bringing  in  bills  for  doubling  laterally  the 
present  lines  as  for  ramifying  them ;  and  if  you  were  also  to 
explain  to  the  shareholders  that  it  -would  be  wiser  to  spend 
their  capital  in  preventing  accidents  attended  by  costly  damages, 
than  in  running  trains  at  a  loss  on  opposition  branches.  It  is 
little  business  of  mine — for  I  am  not  a  railroad  traveller  usually 
more  than  twice  in  the  year;  but  I  don't  like  to  hear  of  peo- 
ple's being  smashed,  even  when  it  is  all  their  fault ;  so  I  will 
ask  you  merely  to  reprint  this  passage  from  my  article  on 
Political  Economy  in  Fraser'^s  Magazine  for  April,  1863,  and 
so  leave  the  matter  to  your  handling : 

"Had  the  money  spent  in  local  mistakes  and  vain  private 

*  An  article  which,  dealing  directly  with  some  recent  railwa}^  accidents, 
commented  especially  on  the  overcrowding  of  the  lines. 


1870.]  LETTERS    ON    RAILWAYS.  89 

litigation  on  the  railroads  of  England  been  laid  out,  instead, 
under  proper  Government  restraint,  on  really  useful  railroad 
work,  and  had  no  absurd  expense  been  incurred  in  ornament, 
ing  stations,  we  might  already  have  had — what  ultimately  it 
will  be  found  we  must  have — quadruple  rails,  two  for  passen- 
gers and  two  for  traffic,  on  every  great  line,  and  we  might  have 
been  carried  in  swift  safety,  and  watched  and  warded  by  well- 
paid  pointsmen,  for  half  the  present  fares."  * 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    KCSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Dec.  7. 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  November  30,  1870.] 

RAILWAY  SAFETY.\ 

To  the  Editor  of"  Tlie  Baihj  Telegraph:' 

Sir  :  I  am  very  busy,  and  have  not  time  to  write  new 
phrases.  Would  you  mind  again  reprinting  (as  you  were  good 
enough  to  do  a  few  days  ago:}:)  a  sentence  from  one  of  the 
books  of  mine  which  everybody  said  were  frantic  when  I  wrote 
them?     You  see  the  date — 1863. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  sei-vant, 

J.  KUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Nov.  29.. 1870. 

I  have  underlined  the  words  I  want  to  be  noticed,  but,  as 
you  see,  made  no  change  in  a  syllable. 

*  "Essays  on  Political  Economy"  (Eraser's  Magazine,  April,  1863,  p. 
449);  "MuneraPulvcris,"  p.  137,  ^128. 

f  This  letter  was  elicited  by  a  leading  article  in  the  Daf/y  Telegraph  of 
November  29,  1870,  upon  railway  accidents,  and  the  means  of  their  pre- 
vention, a  propos  of  two  recent  accidents  which  had  occurred,  both  on  the 
same  day  (November  26,  1870)  on  the  London  and  North-Western  Railway. 

Jin  the  first  letter  on  the  Franco-Prussian  War,  a?2/d,  p.^.  {Daily 
Telegraph,  Oct.  7,  1870.) 


90  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1870. 

Already  the  Goyernment,  not  unapproved,  carries  letters  and 
parcels  for  us.  Larger  packages  may  in  time  follow — even  general 
merchandise  ;  why  not,  at  last,  ourselves?  Had  the  money 
spent  in  local  mistakes  and  vain  private  litigations  on  the  rail- 
roads of  England  been  laid  out,  instead,  under  proper  Govern- 
ment restraint,  on  really  useful  railroad  work,  and  had  no  absurd 
expense  been  i7icurred  in  ornamenting  stations,  we  might  already 
have  had — what  ultimately  it  will  be  found  we  must  have — 
quadruple  rails,  two  for  passengers,  and  tioo  for  traffic,  on  every 
great  line;  and  we  might  have  been  carried  in  swift  safety,  and 
watched  and  warded  by  well-paid  pointsmen,  for  half  the  present 
fares. 


MISCELLANEOUS  LETTERS. 


II. 

SERVANTS    AND    HOUSES. 

JVIastership.     1865 
Experience.     1865 
SoNSHip  AND  Slavery     1865. 
Modern  Houses.    1865. 


n. 

SERVANTS  AND  HOUSES. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  September  5, 1865.] 

DOMESTIC  SERVANTS— MASTERSHIP. 

To  the  Editor  <?/"  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir  :  You  so  seldom  write  noii^ense,  that  you  will,  I  am 
sure,  pardon  your  friends  for  telling  you  when  you  do.  Your 
article  on  servants  to-day  is  nonsense.  It  is  just  as  easy  and  as 
ditticult  now  to  get  good  servants  as  it  ever  was.*  You  may- 
have  them,  as  you  may  have  pines  and  peaches,  for  the  grow- 
ing, or  you  may  even  buy  them  good,  if  you  can  persuade  the 
good  growers  to  spare  you  them  off  their  walls ;  but  you  can- 
not get  them  by  political  economy  and  the  law  of  supply  and 
demand. 

There  are  broadly  two  ways  of  making  good  servants ;  the 
first,  a  sound,  wholesome,  thoroughgoing  slavery — which  was 
the  heathen  way,  and  no  bad  one  neither,  provided  you  under- 
stand that  to  make  real  "  slaves"  you  must  make  yourself  a 
real ''  master"  (which  is  not  easy).  The  second  is  the  Christian's 
way  :  "  whoso  delicately  bringetli  up  his  servant  from  a  child, 
shall  have  him  become  his  son  at  the  last."  f  And  as  few 
people  want  their  servants  to  become  their  sons,  this  is  not  a 
way  to  their  liking.  So  that,  neither  having  courage  or  self- 
discipline  enough  on  the  one  hand  to  make  themselves  nobly 

*  The  article,  after  commcntintr  on  "the  good  old  times,"  remarked 
that  it  is  now  "a  social  fact,  that  the  hardest  tiling  in  the  world  lo  find  is 
a  good  servant." 

f  '-He  tluit  delicately  bringeth  up  his  servant  from  a  child,  shall  have 
him  become  his  son  at  the  length." — Proverbs  xxix.  21. 


94  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1865. 

dominant  after  the  heathen  fashion,  nor  tenderness  or  justice 
enough  to  make  themselves  nobly  protective  after  the  Christian, 
the  present  public  thinks  to  manufacture  servants  bodily  out 
of  powder  and  hay-stuffing — mentally  by  early  instillation  of 
Catechism  and  other  mechanico-religious  appliances — and 
economically,  as  you  helplessly  suggest,  by  the  law  of  supply 
and  demand,^  with  such  results  as  we  all  see,  and  most  of  us 
more  or  less  feel,  and  shall  feel  daily  more  and  more  to  our 
cost  and  selfish  sorrow. 

Sir,  there  is  only  one  way  to  have  good  servants ;  that  is, 
to  be  worthy  of  being  well  served.  All  nature  and  all 
humanity  will  serve  a  good  master,  and  rebel  against  an  ignoble 
one.  And  there  is  no  surer  test  of  the  quality  of  a  nation 
than  the  quality  of  its  servants,  for  they  are  their  masters' 
shadows,  and  distort  their  faults  in  a  flattened  mimicry.  A 
wise  nation  will  have  philosophers  in  its  servants'  hall ;  a 
knavish  nation  will  have  knaves  there  ;  and  a  kindly  nation  will 
have  friends  there.  Only  let  it  be  remembered  that  "  kind- 
ness" means,  as  with  your  child,  so  with  your  servant,  not 
indulgence,  but  care. — I  am.  Sir,  seeing  that  you  usually  write 
good  sense,  and  "  serve"  good  causes,  your  servant  to  command. 

J.  KuSKIN.f 
Denmark  Hill,  Sept.  2. 

*  "We  have  really,"  ran  the  article,  "no  remedy  to  suggest:  the  evil 
seems  to  be  curable  only  by  some  general  distress  which  will  drive  more 
people  into  seeking  service,  and  so  give  employers  a  greater  choice.  At 
present  the  demand  appears  to  exceed  the  supply,  and  servants  are  careless 
about  losing  their  places  through  bad  behavior." 

f  To  this  letter  the  Daily  Telegraph  of  September  6  replied  by  a  leader, 
in  which,  whilst  expressing  itself  alive  to  "the  sympathy  for  humanity 
and  appreciation  of  the  dignity  which  may  be  made  to  underlie  all  human 
relations,"  displayed  by  Mr.  Ruskin,  it  complained  that  he  had  only  shown 
"how  to  cook  the  cook  wiien  we  catch  her,"  and  not  how  to  catch  her. 
After  some  detailed  remarks  on  the  servants  of  the  day,  which  seemed  "to 
be  more  ad  rem  than  Mr.  Ruskin's  eloquent  axioms,"  it  concluded  by 
expressing  a  hope  "  that  he  would  come  down  from  the  clouds  of  theory, 
and  give  to  a  perplexed  public  a  few  plain,  workable  instructions  how  to 
get  hold  of  good  cooks  and  maids,  coachmen  and  footmen." — Mr.  Ruskin 
replies  to  it,  and  to  a  large  amount  of  further  correspondence  on  the  sub- 
ject, in  the  next  two  letters  in  the  Daily  Telegraph. 


18(3o.]  LETTERS   OX    SERVANTS   AND   HOUSES.  96 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  September  7,  1865.] 

DOMESTIC  SERVANTS-EXPERIENCE. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  TJie  Daily  Telegraph:' 

Sir  :  I  thank  you  mucli  for  yonr  kind  insertion  of  my 
letter,  and  yonr  courteous  and  graceful  answer  to  it.  Others 
will  thank  you  also ;  for  your  suggestions  are  indeed  much 
more  ad  rem  than  my  mere  assertions  of  principle ;  but  both 
are  necessary.  Statements  of  practical  difficulty,  and  the 
immediate  means  of  conquering  it,  are  precisely  what  the 
editor  of  a  powerful  daily  journal  is  able  to  give ;  but  he  can- 
not giv^e  them  justly  if  he  ever  allow  himself  to  lose  sight  of 
the  eternal  laws  which  in  their  imperative  bearings  manifest 
themselves  more  clearly  to  the  retired  student  of  human  life 
in  the  phases  of  its  history.  My  ow^n  personal  experience — if 
worth  anything — has  been  simply  that  wherever  I  myself 
knew  how  a  thing  should  be  done,  and  was  resolved  to  have  it 
done,  I  could  always  get  subordinates,  if  made  of  average  good 
human  material,  to  do  it,  and  that,  on  the  whole,  cheerfully, 
thoroughly,  and  even  affectionately ;  and  my  wonder  is  usually 
rather  at  the  quantity  of  service  they  are  willing  to  do  for 
me,  than  at  their  occasional  indolences,  or  fallings  below  the 
standard  of  seraphic  wisdom  and  conscientiousness.  That  they 
shall  be  of  average  human  material,  it  is,  as  you  wisely  point 
out,  every  householder's  business  to  make  sure.  We  cannot 
choose  our  relations,  but  w^e  can  our  servants;  and  what 
sagacity  we  have  and  knowledge  of  human  nature  cannot  be 
better  employed.  If  your  house  is  to  be  comfortable,  your 
servants'  hearts  must  be  sound,  as  the  timber  and  stones  of  its 
walls ;  and  there  must  be  discretion  in  the  choice,  and  time 
allowed  for  the  ''settlino:"  of  both.  The  luxurv  of  havinor 
pretty  servants  must  be  paid  for,  like  all  luxuries,  in  the 
penalty  of  their  occasional  loss ;  but  I  fancy  the  best  sort  of 
female  servant  is  generally  in  aspect  and  general  qualities  like 


96  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1865. 

Sydney  Smith's  "  Bunch, "  ^  and  a  very  retainable  creature. 
And  for  the  rest,  the  dearth  of  good  service,  if  such  there  be, 
may  perhaps  wholesomely  teach  us  that,  if  we  were  all  a  little 
more  in  the  habit  of  serving  ourselves  in  many  matters,  we 
should  be  none  the  worse  or  the  less  happy. 

I  am,  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

J.    RUSKLN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Sept.  6. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  September  18, 1865.] 

DOMESTIC  SEBVANTS:    SONSEIP  AND  SLAVERY. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sm :  I  have  been  w^atching  the  domestic  correspondence  in 
your  columns  with  much  interest,  and  thought  of  offering  you 
a  short  analysis  of  it  when  you  saW'  good  to  bring  it  to  a  close,t 
and  perhaps  a  note  or  two  of  my  own  experience,  being  some- 
what conceited  on  the  subject  just  now,  because  I  have  a 
gardener  wdio  lets  me  keep  old-fashioned  plants  in  the 
greenhouse,  understands  that  my  cherries  are  grown  for  the 
blackbirds,  and  sees  me  gather  a  bunch  of  my  own  grapes  with- 
out making  a  wry  face.  But  your  admirable  article  of  yester- 
day causes  me  to  abandon  my  purpose;  the  more  willingly, 
because  among  all  the  letters  you  have  hitherto  published  there 
is  not  one  from  any  head  of  a  household  which  contains  a  com- 

*  "  A  man-servant  was  too  expensive;  so  I  caught  up  a  little  garden-girl, 
made  like  a  milestone,  put  a  napkin  in  her  hand,  christened  her  Bunch, 
and  made  her  mj'-  buller.  The  girls  taught  her  to  read,  Mrs.  Sydney  to 
wait,  and  I  undertook  her  morals;  Bunch  became  the  best  butler  in  the 
county."— Sydney  Smith's  Memoirs  (vol.  i.  p.  207),  where  several  other 
anecdotes  of  Bunch  are  given. 

f  In  the  "admirable  article"  of  September  15,  in  which  the  main  features 
of  the  voluminous  correspondence  received  by  the  Daily  Telegraph  on  the 
subject  were  shortly  summed  up. 


1865.]  ETTERS   ON   SERVANTS   AND   HOUSES.  97 

plaint  worth  notice.  All  the  masters  or  mistresses  whose  letters 
are  thoughtful  or  well  written  say  they  get  on  well  enough  with 
their  servants ;  no  part  has  yet  been  taken  in  the  discussion  by 
the  heads  of  old  families.  The  servants'  letters,  hitherto, 
furnish  the  best  data ;  but  the  better  class  of  servants  are  also 
silent,  and  must  remain  so.  Launce,  Gruniio,  or  Fairservice  ^^ 
may  have  something  to  say  for  themselves  ;  but  you  will  hear 
nothing  from  Old  Adam  nor  from  carefu'  Mattie.  One  prov- 
erb from  Sancho,  if  we  could  get  it,  would  settle  the  whole 
business  for  us ;  but  his  master  and  he  are  indeed  "  no  more." 
I  would  have  walked  down  to  Dulwich  to  hear  what  Sam 
Weller  had  to  say ;  but  the  high-level  railway  went  through 
Mr.  Pickwick's  parlor  two  months  ago,  and  it  is  of  no  use 
writing  to  Sam,  for,  as  you  are  well  aware,  he  is  no  penman. 
And,  indeed.  Sir,  little  good  will  come  of  any  writing  on  the 
matter.  "  The  cat  will  mew,  the  dog  will  have  his  day."  You 
yourself,  excellent  as  is  the  greater  part  of  what  you  have 
said,  and  to  the  point,  speak  but  vainly  when  you  talk  of 
"  probing  the  evil  to  the  bottom."  This  is  no  sore  that  can 
be  ])rol)ed,  no  sword  nor  bullet  wound.  This  is  a  plague  spot. 
Small  or  great,  it  is  in  the  significance  of  it,  not  in  the  depth, 
that  you  have  to  measure  it.  It  is  essentially  bottomless,  can- 
cerous ;  a  putrescence  through  the  constitution  of  the  people  is 
indicated  by  this  galled  place.  Because  I  know  this  thoroughly, 
I  say  so  little,  and  that  little,  as  your  correspondents  think, 
who  know  nothing  of  me,  and  as  you  say,  who  might  have 
known  more  of  me,  unpractically.  Pardon  me,  I  am  no  seller 
of  plasters,  nor  of  ounces  of  civet.  The  patient's  sickness  is 
his  own  fault,  and  only  years  of  discipline  will  work  it  out  of 
him.  That  is  the  only  really  ''  practical "  saying  that  can  be 
uttered  to  him.  The  relation  of  master  and  servant  involves 
every  other — touches  every  condition  of  moral  health  through 
the  State.  Put  that  right,  and  you  put  all  right ;  but  you  will 
find  it  can  only  come  ultimately,  not  primarily,  right ;   you 

*  Fairservice  is  mentioned  in  Mr.  Ruskin's  discussion  of  parts  of  the 
"Antiquary"  in  "Fiction,  Fair  and  Foul  "  {Nineteenth  Century,  .Tune,  1880) 
as  an  "  example  of  innate  evil,  unafTocted  by  external  influences." 


08 


MISCELLANEOUS    LETTEKS.  [1865. 


cannot  begin  with  it.  Some  of  the  evidence  jou  have  got 
together  is  vakiable,  many  pieces  of  partial  advice  very  good. 
You  need  hardly,  I  think,  unless  you  wanted  a  type  of  British 
logic,  have  printed  a  letter  in  which  the  writer  accused  (or 
would  have  accused,  if  he  had  possessed  Latinity  enough)  all- 
London  servants  of  being  thieves  because  he  had  known  one 
robbery  to  have  been  committed  by  a  nice-looking  girl."  But 
on  the  whole  there  is  much  common-sense  in  the  letters ;  the 
singular  point  in  them  all,  to  my  mind,  being  the  inapprehen- 
sion  of  the  breadth  and  connection  of  the  question,  and  the 
general  resistance  to,  and  stubborn  rejection  of,  the  abstract 
ideas  of  sonship  and  slavery,  which  include  whatever  is  possible 
in  wise  treatment  of  servants.  It  is  very  strange  to  see  that, 
while  everybody  shrinks  at  abstract  suggestions  of  there  being 
possible  error  in  a  book  of  Scripture,t  your  sensible  English 
housewife  fearlessly  rejects  Solomon's  opinion  when  it  runs 
slightly  counter  to  her  own,  and  that  not  one  of  your  many 
correspondents  seems  ever  to  have  read  the  Epistle  to  Phile- 
mon. It  is  no  less  strange  that  while  most  English  boys  of 
ordinary  position  hammer  through  their  Horace  at  one  or  other 
time  of  their  school  life,  no  word  of  his  wit  or  his  teaching 
seems  to  remain  by  them :  for  all  the  good  they  get  out  of 
them,  the  Satires  need  never  have  been  written.  The  Koman 
gentleman's  account  of  his  childhood  and  of  his  domestic  life 
possesses  no  charm  for  them  :  and  even  men  of  education 
would  sometimes  start  to  be  reminded  that  his  ''nodes  coenceque 
Deum  P^  meant  supping  with  his  merry  slaves  on  beans  and 
bacon.  Will  you  allow  me,  on  this  general  question  of  liberty 
and  slavery,  to  refer  your  correspondents  to  a  paper  of  mine 

*  This  refers  to  a  letter  in  which  the  writer  gave  an  account  of  a  robbery 
by  a  housemaid,  and,  drawing  from  her  conduct  the  moral  "put  not  your 
trust  in  London  servants,"  concluded  by  signing  his  letter,  "  Ab  lioc  disce 
omnes." 

f  The  last  volume  of  Bishop  Colenso's  work  on  "The  Pentateuch  and 
Book  of  Joshua  critically  examined  "  was  published  in  the  April  of  the  year 
in  which  these  letters  were  written,  and  his  deposition  by  the  Bishop  of 
Capetown  had  but  recently  been  reversed  by  the  Privy  Council.  It  is  to 
the  discussion  aroused  by  his  book  that  Mr.  Rnskin  indirectly  refers. 


1865.]  LETTERS   ON    SERVANTS    AND    HOUSES.  99 

touching  closely  upon  it,  the  leader  in  the  Art- Journal  for 
July  last  ?  and  to  ask  them  also  to  meditate  a  little  over  the 
two  beautiful  epitaphs  on  Epictetus  and  Zosima,  quoted  in  the 
last  paper  of  the  Idler  ?  * 

^'I,  Epictetus,  was  a  slave;  and  sick  in  body,  and  wretched  in 

poverty;  and  beloved  by  the  gods." 
^^  Zosima,  who  while  she  lived  was  a  slave  only  in  her  body,  has 

now  found  deliverance  for  that  also." 

How  might  we,  over  many  an  "  indepeadent""  Eiaglishman, 
reverse  this  last  leo:end,  and  write —  yy^S-^        '^ '  "^/^^?>v 

/f  ^f^  TUB     ^^/\ 

"  This  man,  who  while  he  lived  w1as"ir6e  only  iu  his  hody,  Jias 
now  found  captivity  for  that  also."     ';       •         _>^.  / 

I  will  not  pass  without  notice — for  it  bears  also  on  wide 
interests — your  correspondent's  question,  how  my  principles  dif- 
fer from  the  ordinary  economist's  view  of  supply  and  demand. + 
Simply  in  that  the  economy  I  have  taught,  in  opposition  to 
the  popular  view,  is  the  science  which  not  merely  ascertains 
the  relations  of  existing  demand  and  supply,  but  determines 
what  ought  to  be  demanded  and  what  can  be  supplied.  A 
child  demands  the  moon,  and,  the  supply  not  being  in  this  case 
equal  to  the  demand,  is  wisely  accommodated  with  a  rattle;  a 
footpad  demand  your  purse,  and  is  supplied  according  to  the 
less  or  more  rational  economy  of  the  State,  with  that  or  a 
halter;  a  foolish  nation,  not  able  to  get  into  its  head  that  free 
trade  does  indeed  mean  the  removal  of  taxation  from  its  im- 
ports, but  not  of  supervision  from  them,  demands  unlimited 
foreign  beef,  and  is  supplied  with  the  cattle  murrain  and  the 

*  The  leader  in  the  ^W-,7<??/?'«an3  Chapter  vi.  of  "The  Cestiisof  Aglaia," 
where  "the  infinite  follies  of  modern  thought,  centred  in  the  notion  that 
liberty  is  good  for  a  man.  irrespectively  of  the  use  he  is  likely  to  make  of 
it,"  are  discussed  at  some  length.  The  epitaphs  quoted  are  not  in  the  Idler 
itself,  but  in  the  "  Essay  on  Epitaphs"  printed  at  the  end  of  some  editions 
of  it. 

f  This  refers  to  a  letter  signed  "  W.  B."  in  the  Daily  Tekgraph  of  Sep- 
tember 12. 


100  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1865. 

like.  There  may  be  all  manner  of  demands,  all  manner  of 
supplies.  The  true  political  economist  regulates  these;  the 
false  political  economist  leaves  them  to  be  regulated  by  (not 
Divine)  Providence.  For,  indeed,  the  largest  iinal  demand 
anywhere  reported  of,  is  that  of  hell ;  and  the  supply  of  it  (by 
the  broad-gauge  line)  would  be  very  nearly  equal  to  the  demand 
at  this  day,  unless  there  were  here  and  there  a  swineherd  or 
two  who  could  keep  his  pigs  out  of  sight  of  the  lake. 

Thus  in  this  business  of  servants  everything  depends  on 
what  sort  of  servant  you  at  heart  wish  for  or  *'  demand."  If 
for  nurses  you  want  Charlotte  Winsors,  they  are  to  be  had  for 
money ;  but  by  no  means  for  money,  such  as  that  German  girl 
who,  the  other  day,  on  her  own  scarce-floating  fragment  of 
wreck,  saved  the  abandoned  child  of  anotlier  woman,  keeping 
it  alive  by  the  moisture  from  her  lips.''^  What  kind  of  servant 
do  you  want  ?  It  is  a  momentous  question  for  you  yourself — 
for  tlie  nation  itself.  Are  we  to  be  a  nation  of  shopkeepers, 
wanting  only  shop-boys ;  or  of  manufacturers,  wanting  only 
hands ;  or  are  there  to  be  knights  among  us,  w^ho  will  need 
squires — captains  among  us,  needing  crews  ?  Will  you  have 
clansmen  for  your  candlesticks,  or  silver  plate?  Myrmidons 
at  your  tents,  ant-born,  or  only  a  mob  on  the  Gillies'  Hill  ? 
Are  you  resolved  that  you  will  never  have  any  but  your  infe- 
i-iors  to  serve  you,  or  shall  Enid  ever  lay  your  trencher  with 
tender  little  thumb,  and  Cinderella  sweep  your  hearth,  and  be 
cherished  there  ?  It  might  come  to  that  in  time,  and  plate 
and  hearth  be  the  brighter ;  but  if  your  servants  are  to  be  held 
your  inferiors,  at  least  bo  sure  they  a?'e  so,  and  that  you  are 
indeed  wiser,  and  better-tempered,  and  more  useful  than  they. 
Determine  what  their  education  ouo^ht  to  be,  and  oro^anize 
proper  servants'  schools,  and  there  give  it  them.  So  they  will 
be  tit  for  their  position,  and  will  do  honor  to  it,  and  stay  in  it: 
let  the  masters  be  as  sure  they  do  honor  to  theirs,  and  are  as 
willing  to  stay  in  that.     Remember  that  every  people  which 

*  Charlotte  Winsor  was  at  this  time  under  sentence  of  death  for  tlie 
murder  of  a  child,  which  had  been  entrusted  to  her  charge.  I  have  been 
unable  to  verify  the  anecdote  of  her  heroic  anti-type. 


1865.]  LETTERS   OX   SERVANTS   AND   HOUSES.  101 

gives  itself  to  the  pursuit  of  riches,  invariably,  and  of  neces- 
6itj7gGts  the  scum  uppermost  iu  time,  and  is  set  hy  the  genii, 
like  the  ugly  bridegroom  iu  the  Arabian  Nights,  at  its  own 
door  with  its  heels  in  the  air,  showing  its  shoe-soles  instead  of 
a  Face.  And  the  reversal  is  a  serious  matter,  if  reversal  be 
even  possible,  and  it  comes  right  end  uppermost  again,  instead 
of  to  conclusive  Wrong  end. 

I  suppose  I  am  getting  unpractical  again.  Well,  here  is  one 
practical  morsel,  and  I  have  done.  One  or  two  of  your  cor- 
respondents have  spoken  of  the  facilities  of  servants  for  leav- 
ing their  places.  Drive  that  nail  home.  Sir.  A  large  stray 
branch  of  the  difficulty  lies  there.  Many  and  many  a  time  I 
have  heard  Mr.  Carlyle  speak  of  this,  and  too  often  I  have  felt 
it  myself  as  one  of  the  evils  closely  accompanying  the  fever  of 
modern  change  in  the  habits  and  hopes  of  life.  My  own  archi- 
tectural work  drives  me  to  think  of  it  continually.  Round 
every  railroad  station,  out  of  the  once  quiet  fields,  there  bursts 
ujD  first  a  blotch  of  brick-fields,  and  then  of  ghastly  houses, 
washed  over  with  slime  into  miserable  fineries  of  cornice  and 
portico.  A  gentleman  would  hew  for  himself  a  log  hut,  and 
thresh  for  himself  a  straw  bed,  before  he  would  live  in  such ; 
but  the  builders  count  safely  on  tenants — people  who  know 
no  quietness  nor  simplicity  of  pleasure,  who  care  only  for  the 
stucco,  and  lodge  only  in  the  portico,  of  human  life — under- 
standing not  so  much  as  the  name  of  House  or  House- Hold. 
They  and  their  servants  are  always  "bettering  themselves" 
divergently. 

You  will  do  good  service  at  least  in  teaching  any  of  these 
who  will  listen  to  you,  that  if  they  can  once  make  up  their 
minds  to  a  fixed  state  of  life,  and  a  fixed  income,  and  a  fixed 
expenditure — if  they  can  by  any  means  get  their  servants  to 
stay  long  enough  with  them  to  fit  into  their  places  and  know 
the  run  of  the  furrows — then  something  like  service  and  mas- 
tership, and  fulfilment  of  understood  and  reciprocal  duty,  may 
become  possible ;  no  otherwise.  I  leave  this  matter  to  your 
better  handling,  and  will  trespass  on  your  patience  no  more. 
Only,  as  I  think  you  will  get  into  some  disgrace  with  your 


102  MISCELLAJ^EOUS    LETTERS.  [1865. 

lady  correspondents  for  joiir  ungallant  conclusions  respecting 
tliem"^ — wliicli  I  confess  surprised  me  a  little,  though  I  might 
have  been  prepared  for  it  if  I  had  remembered  what  order  the 
husband  even  of  so  good  a  housewife  as  Penelope  was  obliged 
to  take  with  some  of  her  female  servants  after  prolonged 
absence, — I  have  translated  a  short  passage  of  Xenophon's 
Economics  t  for  you,  which  may  make  your  peace  if  you  will 
print  it.  I  w^ish  the  whole  book  were  well  translated ;  mean- 
time, your  lady  readers  must  be  told  that  this  is  part  of  a 
Greek  country  gentleman's  account  of  the  conversation  he  had 
Avith  his  young  wife  (a  girl  of  fifteen  only),  a  little  while  after 
their  marriage,  when  ^'  she  had  got  used  to  him,"  and  was  not 
frightened  at  being  spoken  gravely  to.  First  they  pray  toge- 
ther ;  and  then  they  have  a  long  happy  talk,  of  which  this  is 
the  close : 

"But  there  is  one  of  the  duties  belonging  to  you,"  I  said, 
*' which  perhaps  will  be  more  painful  to  you  than  any  other, 
namely,  the  care  of  your  servants  when  they  are  ill."  '^Kay," 
answered  my  wife,  "  that  will  be  the  most  pleasing  of  all  my 
duties  to  me,  if  only  my  servants  will  be  grateful  when  I  minis- 
ter rightly  to  them,  and  will  love  me  better."  And  I,  pleased 
with  her  answer,  said,  "Indeed,  lady,  it  is  in  some  such  way  as 

*  The  "admirable  article"  which  had  closed  the  discussion  advised  mis 
tresses  to  resemble  those  of  the  good  old  days,  and  to  deserve  good  servants, 
if  they  wished  to  secure  them.  It,  somewhat  inconsistently  with  the  pre- 
vious articles,  declared  that  the  days  of  good  service  would  not  be  found 
altogether  past,  if  it  was  remembered  that  by  derivation  "domestic"  meant 
"homelike,"  and  "family"  one's  servants,  not  one's  children. 

f  See  "The  Economist  of  Xenophon,"  siuce  (1875)  translated  and  pub- 
lished in  the  "Bibliotheca  Pastorum,"  edited  by  Mr.  Raskin  (vol.  i.  p.  50, 
chap.  vii.  §§  37-43).  Mr.  Ruskin  in  his  preface  to  the  volume  speaks  of 
the  book  as  containing  "first,  a  faultless  definition  of  wealth"  .  .  . 
"secondly,  the  most  perfect  ideal  of  kingly  character  and  kingly  govern- 
ment given  in  literature"  ....  and  "thirdly,  the  ideal  of  domestic 
life."  It  may  be  interesting  to  note  an  earlier  and  quaint  estimate  of  the 
work,  given  in  "  Xenophon's  Treatise  of  Housholde — imprinted  at  London, 
in  Fleet  Street,  by  T.  Berthelet,  1534,"  where  the  dialogue  is  described  as 
"ryght  counnyngly  translated  out  of  the  Greke  tongue  into  Englysshe  by 
Gentian  Hervet  at  the  desyre  of  Mayster  Geffrey  Pole,  whiche  boke  for 
the  welthe  of  this  realme  I  deme  very  profitable  to  be  red. " 


1865.]  LETTERS   ON    SERVANTS   AND    HOUSES.  103 

this  that  the  queen  of  tlie  hive  is  so  regarded  by  her  bees,  that, 
if  she  leave  the  hive,  none  will  quit  her,  but  all  will  follow  her." 
Then  she  answered,  "  I  should  wonder  if  this  office  of  leader 
were  not  yours  rather' than  mine,  for  truly  my  care  and  distribu- 
tion of  things  would  be  but  a  jest  were  it  not  for  your  inbring- 
ing."  ''Yes,"  I  said,  '' but  what  a  jest  would  my  inbringing 
be  if  there  were  no  one  to  take  care  of  what  I  brought.  Do  not 
you  know  how  those  are  pitied  of  whom  it  is  fabled  that  they 
have  always  to  pour  water  into  a  pierced  vessel?"  '^Yes;  and 
they  are  unhappy,  if  in  truth  they  do  it,"  said  she.  '*Then 
also,"  I  said,  "remember  your  other  personal  cares.  Will  aU 
be  sweet  to  you  when,  taking  one  of  your  maidens  who  knows 
not  how  to  spin,  you  teach  her,  and  make  her  twice  the  girl  she 
was  ;  or  one  who  has  no  method  nor  habit  of  direction,  and  you 
teach  her  how  to  manage  a  house,  and  make  her  faithful  and 
mistress-like  and  every  way  worthy,  and  when  you  have  the 
power  of  benefiting  those  who  are  orderly  and  useful  in  the 
house,  and  of  punishmg  any  one  who  is  manifestly  disposed  to 
evil?  But  what  will  be  sweetest  of  all,  if  it  may  come  to  pass, 
will  be  that  you  should  show  yourself  better  even  than  me,  and 
so  make  me  your  servant  also  :  so  that  you  need  not  fear  in 
advancing  age  to  be  less  honored  in  my  house ;  but  may  have 
sure  hope  that  in  becoming  old,  by  how  much  more  you  have 
become  also  a  noble  fellow-worker  with  me,  and  joint  guardian 
of  our  children's  possessions,  by  so  much  shall  you  be  more  hon- 
ored in  my  household.  For  what  is  lovely  and  good  increases 
for  all  men — not  through  fairness  of  the  body,  but  through 
strength  and  virtue  in  things  pertaining  to  life."  And  this  is 
what  I  remember  chiefly  of  what  we  said  in  our  first  talk  toge- 
ther. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Sept.  16. 


104  MISCELLAJS'EOUS  LETTERS.  [1865. 

LFrom  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  October  17,  1865.] 

MODERN  HOUSES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir  :  I  trust  yon  will  liold  the  very  able  and  interesting  letter 
from  "  W.  H.  W.,"  *  which  you  publish  to-day,  excuse  enough 
for  my  briefly  trespassing  on  your  space  once  more.  Indeed, 
it  has  been  a  discomfort  to  me  that  I  have  not  yet  asked  the 
pardon  of  your  correspondent,  "  A  Tenant,  not  at  will "  (Sept. 
21),t  for  the  apparent  discourtesy  of  thought  of  which  he 
accused  me.  He  need  not  have  done  so  :  for  although  I  said 
"a  gentleman  would  hew  for  himself  a  log  hut"  rather  than 
live  in  modern  houses,  I  never  said  he  would  rather  abandon 
his  family  and  his  business  than  live  in  them ;  and  your  corre- 
spondent himself,  in  his  previously  written  letter,  had  used 
precisely  the  same  words.  And  he  must  not  suspect  that  I 
intend  to  be  ironical  in  saying  that  the  prolonged  coincidence 
of  thought  and  word  in  the  two  letters  Avell  deserves  the  notice 

*  The  letter  of  "  W.  H.  W."  commenced  by  stating  that  the  writer  had 
"  waited  till  the  discussion  ....  about  domestic  servants  was  brought  to 
a  close  to  make  a  few  remarks  on  a  subject  touched  on  in  Mr.  Ruskm's 
last  letter — domestic  architecture."  It  then  gave  a  "graphic  description" 
of  "W.  H.  W.'s"  own  modern  villa  and  its  miseries,  and  concluded  by- 
asking  Mr  Ruskin  if  nothing  could  be  done  ! 

f  "A  Tenant,  not  at  will  "  had  written  to  point  out  the  coincidence  that 
he  had,  before  the  publication  of  Mr.  Ruskin's  third  letter,  himself  begun 
a  letter  to  the  Daili/  Telegraph  on  the  subject  of  houses,  in  parts  of  which, 
strangely  enough,  he  had  used  expressions  very  similar  to  those  of  Mr. 
Ruskin  (see  ante,  pp.  147-8).  He  had  described  his  modern  suburban  villa 
as  "one  of  an  ugly  mass  of  blossoms  lately  burst  forth  from  the  parent 
trunk — a  brickfield;"  and  declared  that  if  it  were  not  that  people  would 
think  him  mad,  he  "would  infinitely  rather  live  in  a  log  hut  of  his  own 
building"  than  in  a  builder's  villa.  He  concluded  by  saying  that  all  the 
houses  were  the  same,  and  that  therefore,  until  Mr.  Ruskin  could  point 
out  honest-built  dwellings  neglected  while  the  "villas"  were  all  let,  it  was 
not  quite  fair  of  him  to  assume  that  "suburban  villains"  utterly  wanted 
the  true  instinct  of  gentlemen  which  would  lead  to  the  preference  of  log 
huts  to  plaster  palaces. 


1865.]  LETTERS   ON    SERVANTS   AND    HOUSES.  105 

of  your  readers,  in  the  proof  it  gives  of  the  strength  and  truth 
of  the  impression  on  both  minds.  ''  W.  II.  W.'s"  graphic 
description  of  liis  house  is  also  sorrowfully  faithful  to  the  facts 
of  daily  experience;  and  1  doubt  not  that  you  will  soon  have 
other  connnunications  of  the  same  tenor,  and  all  too  true. 

I  made  no  attempt  to  answer  "A  Tenant,  not  at  will," 
because  the  subject  is  much  too  wide  for  any  detailed  treat- 
ment in  a  letter ;  and  you  do  not  care  for  generalizations  of 
mine.  But  I  am  sure  your  two  correspondents,  and  the  large 
class  of  suiferers  which  they  represent,  would  be  very  sincerely 
grateful  for  some  generalizations  of  yours  on  this  matter.  For, 
Sir,  surely  of  all  q«estions  for  the  political  economist,  this  of 
putting  good  houses  over  people's  heads  is  the  closest  and 
simplest.  The  first  question  in  all  economy,  practically  as  well 
as  etymologically,  nnist  be  this,  of  lodging.  The  "  Eco"  must 
come  before  the  "Nomy."  You  must  have  a  house  before 
you  can  put  anything  into  it ;  and  preparatorily  to  laying  up 
treasure,  at  the  least  dig  a  hole  for  it.  Well,  Sir,  here,  as  it 
seems  to  my  poor  thinking,  is  a  beautiful  and  simple  problem 
for  you  to  illustrate  the  law  of  demand  and  supply  upon. 
Here  you  have  a  considerable  body  of  very  deserving  persons 
"  demanding"  a  good  and  cheap  article  in  the  way  of  a  house. 
Will  you  or  any  of  your  politico-economic  correspondents 
explain  to  them  and  to  me  the  Divinely  Providential  law  by 
which,  in  due  course,  the  supply  of  such  cannot  but  be  brought 
about  for  them  ? 

There  is  another  column  in  your  impression  of  to-day  to 
which,  also,  I  would  ask  leave  to  direct  your  readers'  attention 
— the  4th  of  the  3d  page ;  and  especially,  at  the  bottom  of  it. 
Dr.  Whitmore's  account  of  Crawford  Place,"^  and  his  following 
statement  that  it  is  "  a  kind  of  property  constituting  a  most 

*  The  account  consisted  of  a  report  presented  by  Dr.  Whitmore,  as 
Metropolitan  Officer  of  Health  to  the  district,  to  the  Marylebone  Repre- 
sentative Council.  Describing  the  miseries  of  Crawford  Place,  which  was 
left  in  an  untenantable  condition,  while  the  landlords  still  got  high  rents 
for  it.  he  added  that  "property  of  this  description,  let  out  in  separate 
rooms  to  weekly  tenants,  constitutes  a  most  profitable  investment,"  accord- 
ing to  the  degree  of  tlinty  determination  exercised  in  collecting  the  rents. 


106  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1865. 

profitable  investment ;"  and  I  do  so  in  the  hope  that  you  will 
expand  your  interpretation  of  the  laws  of  political  economy 
so  far  as  to  teach  us  how,  by  their  beneficent  and  inevitable 
operation,  good  houses  nmst  finally  be  provided  for  the  classes 
who  live  in  Crawford  Place,  and  such  other  places ;  and,  with- 
out necessity  of  eviction,  also  for  the  colliers  of  Cramlington 
{vide  2d  column  of  the  same  3d  page).*  I  have,  indeed,  my 
own  notions  on  the  subject,  but  I  do  not  trouble  you  with  them, 
for  they  are  unfortunately  based  on  that  wild  notion  of  there 
being  a  "just"  price  for  all  things,  which  you  say  in  your 
article  of  Oct.  10,  on  the  Sheffield  strikes,  "  has  no  existence 
but  in  the  minds  of  theorists."  f  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  with 
which  journal  I  have  already  held  some  discussion  on  the  sub- 
ject, eagerly  quoted  your  authority  on  its  side,  in  its  impression 
of  the  same  evening ;  nor  do  I  care  to  j^ursue  the  debate  until 
I  can  inform  you  of  the  continuous  result  of  some  direct  results 
which  I  am  making  on  my  Utopian  principles.  I  have  bought 
a  little  bit  of  property  of  the  Crawford  Place  description,  and 
mending  it  somewhat  according  to  my  notions,  I  make  my 
tenants  pay  me  what  I  hold  to  be  a  "just"  price  for  the  lodging 
provided.  That  lodging  I  partly  look  after,  partly  teach  the 
tenants  to  look  after  for  themsel  ves ;  and  I  look  a  little  after 
them,  as  well  as  after  the  rpnts.  I  do  not  mean  to  make  a 
highly  profitable  investment  of  their  poor  little  rooms ;  but  I  do 
mean  to  sell  a  good  article,  in  the  way  of  house  room,  at  a  fair 
price ;  and  hitlierto  my  customers  are  satisfied,  and  so  am  I.:j: 

*  This  alludes  to  an  account  of  the  position  of  the  Cramlington  colliers 
after  seventeen  days  of  strike.  The  masters  attempted  to  evict  the  pitmen 
from  their  houses,  an  attempt  which  the  pitmen  met  partly  by  serious  riot 
and  resistance,  and  partly  by  destroying  the  houses  they  were  forced  to 
leave. 

f  "  Such  a  thing  as  a  '  just  price,'  either  for  labor  or  for  any  other  com- 
modity, has,  with  all  submission  to  Mr.  Ruskin,  no  existence  save  in  the 
minds  of  theorists."  {Daily  Telerjraph,  Oct.  10,  quoted  by  the  Pall  Mall  in 
its  "Epitome  of  the  Morning  Papers"  on  the  same  day.)  The  discussion 
with  the  Gazette  consisted  of  the  "Work  and  Wages"  letters  (see  ante,  pp. 
72  seqq.). 

X  See  "  Fors  Clavigera,"  1877,  Letter  78,  Notes  and  Correspondence,  p. 
170. 


1865.]  LETTERS   ON   SERVANTS    AND    HOUSES.  107 

In  the  mean  time,  being  entirely  busy  in  other  directions, 
ij  I  must  leave  the  discussion,  if  it  is  to  proceed  at  all,  wholly 
le  between  you  and  your  readers.  I  will  write  no  word  more  till 
I  see  what  they  all  have  got  to  say,  and  until  you  yourself  have 
explained  to  me,  in  its  anticipated  results,  the  working — as 
n  regards  the  keeping  out  of  winter  and  rough  weather — of  the 
principles  of  Xon-iquity  (I  presume  that  is  the  proper  politico- 
economic  form  for  the  old  and  exploded  word  Iniquity);  and 
so  I  remain.  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

1  J.    EUSKIN. 

Denmark  Hill,  Oct.  16. 


\ 


i 


MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS. 


III. 

ROMAN  INUNDATIOlt^S. 

A  King's  First  Duty.     1871. 
A  Nation's  Defences.    1871. 
The  Waters  of  Comfort.     1871. 
The  Streams  of  Italy.     1871. 
The  Streets  of  London.     1871. 


I 


m. 

ROMAN  INUNDATIONS. 


[From  "  The  Dailj-  Telegraph,"  January  12.  1871.    Also  reprinted  in  "  Fors  Clavigera, 
1873,  Letter  33,  p.  23.] 


A  KING'S  FIRST  DUTY. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir  :  May  I  ask  you  to  add  to  your  article  on  the  inundation 
of  the  Tiber  some  momentary  invitation  to  your  readers  to 
tliink  with  Horace  ratlier  than  to  smile  with  him  ? 

In  the  briefest  and  proudest  words  he  wrote  of  himself  he 
thought  of  his  native  land  chiefly  as  divided  into  the  two  dis- 
tricts of  violent  and  scanty  waters : 

"Dicar,  qua  violens  obstrepit  Aufidns, 
Et  qua.  pauper  aquce,  Daunus  agrestium 
Regnavit  populorum."* 

E'ow  the  anger  and  power  of  that  ''  tauriformis  Aufidus"  is 
precisely  because  "regna  Dauni  prgefliiit" — because  it  flows 
past  the  poor  kingdoms  which  it  should  enrich.  Stay  it  there, 
and  it  is  treasure  instead  of  ruin.  And  so  also  with  Tiber  and 
Eridanus.     They  are  so  much  gold,  at  their  sources — they  are 

*  On  December  27  there  was  a  disastrous  inundation  of  the  Tiber,  and  a 
great  part  of  Rome  was  flooded.  The  Daily  TeUr/raph  in  its  leading  article 
of  Jan.  10.  1871,  on  the  subject,  began  by  quoting  from  the  "very  neatest," 
"sparkling,"  "light-hearted"  ode  of  Horace,  "Jam  satis  terris  nivis" 
(Horace,  Odes,  i.  2).  The  quotations  in  the  letter  are  from  Odes  iv.  14,  25, 
and  from  the  celebrated  ode  beginning  "  Exegi  monumentum  oere  perea- 
nius"  (Odes,  iii.  30). 


112  MISCELLAKEOUS    LETTERS.  [1871. 

SO  much  death,  if  thej  once  break  down  unbridled  into  the 
plains. 

At  the  end  of  your  report  of  the  events  of  the  inundation, 
it  is  said  that  the  King  of  Italy  expressed  "  an  earnest  desire  to 
do  something,  as  far  as  science  and  industry  could  effect  it,  to 
prevent  or  mitigate  inundations  for  the  future." 

Now  science  and  industry  can  do,  not  "  something,"  but 
everything,  and  not  merely  to  mitigate  inundations — and, 
deadliest  of  inundations,  because  perpetual,  maremmas — but  to 
cliange  them  into  national  banks  instead  of  debts. 

The  first  thing  the  King  of  any  country  has  to  do  is  to 
manage  the  streams  of  it. 

If  he  can  manage  the  streams,  he  can  also  the  people ;  for 
the  people  also  form  alternately  torrent  and  maremma,  in  pes- 
tilential fury  or  pestilential  idleness.  They  also  will  change 
into  living  streams  of  men,  if  their  Kings  literally  "  lead  them 
forth  beside  the  waters  of  comfort."  Half  the  money  lost  by 
this  inundation  of  Tiber,  spent  rightly  on  the  hill-sides  last 
summer,  would  have  changed  every  wave  of  it  into  so  much 
fruit  and  foliage  in  spring  whei-e  now  there  will  be  only  burn- 
ing rock.  And  the  men  who  have  been  killed  within  the  last 
two  months,  and  whose  work,  and  the  money  spent  in  doing  it, 
have  tilled  Europe  with  misery  which  fifty  years  will  not  efface,* 
had  they  been  set  at  the  same  cost  to  do  good  instead  of  evil, 
and  to  save  life  instead  of  destroying  it,  might,  by  this  10th  of 
January,  1871,  have  embanked  every  dangerous  stream  at  the 
roots  of  the  Rhine,  the  Ehone,  and  the  Po,  and  left  to  Ger- 
many, to  France,  and  to  Italy  an  inheritance  of  blessing  for 
centuries  to  come — they  and  their  families  living  all  the  while 
in  brightest  happiness  and  peace.  And  now !  Let  the  Red 
Prince  look  to  it;  red  inundation  bears  also  its  fruit  in  time. 
I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

John  Ruskin. 

Jan.  10. 

*  This  letter,  it  will  be  noticed,  was  written  during  the  bombardment 
of  Paris  in  the  Franco-Prussian  war. 


|i 


1871.]  LETTERS    ON    KO.MAN    IN  LNDATIONS.  113 


[From  **The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  January  19,  1871.] 

A   NATION'S  DEFENCES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "The  PaU  Mall  Gazette" 

Sir  :  The  letter  to  which  you  do  me  the  lionor  to  refer,  in 
your  yesterday's  article  on  the  Tiber,  entered  into  no  detail,* 
because  I  liad  ah-eady  laid  tlio  plans  spoken  of  before  the  Koyal 
Institution  in  my  lecture  there  last  February ;  f  in  which  my 
principal  object  was  to  state  the  causes  of  the  incalculably 
destructive  inundations  of  the  Ehone,  Toccia,  and  Ticino,  in 
186S  ;  and  to  point  out  that  no  mountain  river  ever  was  or  can 
be  successfully  embanked  in  the  valleys ;  but  that  the  rainfall 
must  be  arrested  on  the  high  and  softly  rounded  hill  surfaces, 
before  it  reaches  any  ravine  in  which  its  force  can  be  concen- 
trated. Every  mountain  farm  ought  to  have  a  dike  about  two 
feet  high — with  a  small  ditch  within  it — carried  at  intervals  in 
regular,  scarcely  perceptible  incline  across  its  fields ;  with  dis- 
charge into  a  reservoir  large  enough  to  contain  a  week's  maxi- 
mum rainfall  on  the  area  of  that  farm  in  the  stormiest  weather — 

*  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette  had  quoted  part  of  the  preceding  letter,  and 
had  spoken  of  "  a  remedy  which  Mr.  Ruskin  himself  appears  to  contem- 
plate, though  he  describes  it  in  rather  a  nebulous  manner." 

f  "  A  Talk  respecting  Verona  and  its  Rivers,"  February  4,  1870.  (See 
Proceedings  of  the  Royal  Institution,  vol.  vi.  p.  55.  The  report  of  the 
lecture  was  also  printed  by  the  Institution  in  a  separate  form;  pp.  7.)  The 
ecture  concluded  thus:  "Further,  without  in  the  least  urging  my  plans 
impatiently  on  any  one  else,  I  know  thoroughly  that  this  [the  protection 
against  inundations]  which  I  have  said  should  be  done,  can  be  done,  for 
the  Italian  rivers,  and  that  no  method  of  employment  of  our  idle  able- 
bodied  laborers  would  be  in  the  end  more  remunerative,  or  in  the  begin- 
nings of  it  more  healthful  and  every  way  beneficial  than,  with  the  concur- 
rence of  the  Italian  and  Swiss  governments,  setting  them  to  redeem  the 
valleys  of  the  Ticino  and  the  Rhone.  And  I  pray  you  to  think  of  this;  for 
I  tell  you  truly — you  who  care  for  Italy — that  both  her  passions  and  her 
mountain  streams  are  noble;  but  that  her  happiness  depends  not  on  the 
liberty,  but  the  right  government  of  both." 


114  MISCELLAXEOUS    LETTERS.  [1871. 

the  liiglier  uncultivated  land  being  guarded  over  larger  spaces 
with  bolder  embankments.  No  drop  of  water  that  had  once 
touched  hill  ground  ought  ever  to  reach  the  plains  till  it  was 
wanted  there  :  and  the  maintenance  of  the  bank  and  reservoir, 
once  built,  on  any  farm,  would  not  cost  more  than  the  keeping 
up  of  its  cattle-sheds  against  chance  of  whirlwind  and  snow. 

The  first  construction  of  the  work  would  be  costly  enough ; 
and,  say  the  Economists,  "  would  not  pay."  I  never  heard  of 
any  National  Defences  that  did  !  Presumably,  we  shall  have 
to  pay  more  income-tax  next  year,  without  hope  of  any  divi- 
dend on  the  disbursement.  Nay — you  must  usually  wait  a 
year  or  two  before  you  get  paid  for  any  great  work,  even  when 
the  gain  is  secure.  The  fortifications  of  Paris  did  not  pay,  till 
very  lately ;  they  are  doubtless  returning  cent,  per  cent,  now, 
since  the  kind  of  rain  falls  heavy  within  them  which  they  were 
meant  to  catch.  Our  experimental  embankments  against  (per- 
haps too  economically  cheap)  shot  at  Shoeburyness  are  property  i 
which  we  can  only  safely  "  realize"  under  similarly  favorable  i 
conditions.  But  my  low  embankments  would  not  depend  for 
their  utility  on  the  advent  of  a  hypothetical  foe,  but  would 
have  to  contend  with  an  instant  and  inevitable  one ;  yet  with  i 
one  who  is  only  an  adversary  if  unresisted ;  who,  resisted, 
becomes  a  faithful  friend — a  lavish  benefactor. 

Give  me  the  old  bayonets  in  the  Tower,  if  I  can't  have 
anything  so  good  as  spades ;  and  a  few  regiments  of  "  volun- 
teers" with  good  Engineer  officers  over  them,  and,  in  three 
years'  time,  an  Inundation  of  Tiber,  at  least,  shall  be  Impossible. 
I  am.  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

John  Kuskin. 
Denmark  Hill,  Jan.  19,  1871. 


1871.]  LETTERS    OS    KOMAX    INUNUATIOXS.  Il6 


[From  •'  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  February  4,  1871,] 

THE   WATERS    OF   COMFORT. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Tthgraph." 

Sir  :  I  did  not  see  your  impression  of  yesterday  until  too 
late  to  reply  to  the  question  of  your  correspondent  in  Home ;  * 
and  I  am  hurried  to-day ;  but  will  send  you  to-morrow  a  pre- 
cise statement  of  what  I  believe  can  be  done  in  the  Italian 
uplands.  The  simplest  and  surest  beginning  would  be  the  pur- 
chase, either  by  the  Government  or  by  a  small  company  formed 
in  Rome,  of  a  few  plots  of  highland  in  the  Apennines,  now 
barren  for  want  of  water,  and  valueless  ;  and  the  showing  what 
could  be  made  of  them  by  terraced  irrigation  such  as  English 
officers  have  already  introduced  in  many  parts  of  India.  The 
Agricultural  College  at  Cirencester  ought,  I  think,  to  be  able 
to  send  out  two  or  three  superintendents,  who  would  direct 
rightly  the  iirst  processes  of  cultivation,  choosing  for  purchase 
good  soil  in  good  exposures,  and  which  would  need  only  irri- 
gation to  become  fruitful ;  and  by  next  summer,  if  not  by  the 
end  of  this,  there  would  be  growing  food  for  men  and  cattle 
where  now  there  is  only  hot  dust;  and  I  do  not  think  there 
would  be  much  further  question  "  where  the  money  was  to 
come  from."  The  real  question  is  only,  "'Will  you  paf/  your 
money  in  advance  for  what  is  actually  new  land  added  to  the 
kingdom  of  living  Italy  f '  or  ''  Will  you  pay  it  under  call  from 
the  Tiber  every  ten  or  twenty  years  as  the  price  of  the  work 
done  by  the  river  for  your  destruction  ?" 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

Oxford,  Feb.  3. 

*  The  correspondent  of  the  Daib/  Telefjraph  had  written  that  Mr.  Rus- 
kin's  letter  of  January  10  had  been  transhited  into  Italian  and  had  set 
people  thinking,  and  he  asked  Mr.  Ruskin  to  -write  and  state  the  case  once 
more. 


116  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1871. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  February  7, 1871. | 

THE  STREAMS  OF  ITALY* 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraphr 

Sir:  In  tliis  month,  jnst  thirty  years  ago,  I  was  at  Naples, 
and  the  days  were  nearly  as  dark  as  these,  bat  w4th  clouds  and 
rain,  not  fog.  The  streets  leading  down  from  St.  Elmo  became 
beds  of  torrents.  A  story  went  about — true  or  not  I  do  not 
know,  but  credible  enough — of  a  child's  having  been  carried 
off  by  the  gutter  and  drowned  at  the  bottom  of  the  hill.  At 
last  came  indeed  wdiat,  in  those  simple  times,  people  thought  a 
serious  loss  of  life.  A  heavy  storm  burst  one  night  above  a 
village  on  the  flank  of  the  Monte  St.  Angelo,  a  mile  or  two 
south  of  Pompeii.  The  limestones  slope  steeply  there  under 
about  three  feet  of  block  earth.  The  water  peeled  a  piece  of  the 
rock  of  its  earth,  as  one  would  peel  an  orange,  and  brought 
down  three  or  four  acres  of  the  good  soil  in  a  heap  on  the 
village  at  midnight,  driving  in  the  upper  walls,  and  briefly 
burying  some  fourteen  or  flfteen  people  in  their  sleep — and, 
as  I  say,  in  those  times  there  was  some  talk  eveii^about  four- 
teen or  fifteen.  But  the  same  kind  of  thing  takes  place,  of 
course,  more  or  less,  among  the  hills  in  almost  every  violent 
storm,  generally  with  the  double  result  of  ruining  more  ground 
below  than  is  removed  from  the  rocks  above ;  for  the  frantic 
streams  mostly  finish  their  work  with  a  heap  of  gravel  and 
blocks  of  stone  like  that  wdiicli  came  down  the  ravine  below 
the  glacier  of  Greppond  about  ten  years  ago,  and  destroyed, 
for  at  least  fifty  years  to  come,  some  of  quite  the  best  land  in 
Chamouni. 

In  slower,  but  ceaseless  process  of  ruin,  the  Po,  Arno,  and 
Tiber  steadily  remove  the  soil  from  the  hills,  and  carry  it  down 
to  their   deltas.     The  Venetians   have    contended   now  for  a 

*  See  the  date  of  the  letter  on  a  landslip  near  Giagnano  (vol.  i.  p.  302.) 


1871.]  LETTERS    OX    ROMAN    INUNDATIONS.  117 

thousand  years  in  vain  even  with  the  Brenta  and  the  minor 
streams  that  enter  their  lagoons,  and  liave  only  kept  their 
canals  clear  by  turning  the  river  south  to  Malaniocco  with 
embankments  which  have  unhealthily  checked  the  drainage  of 
all  the  flat  country  about  Padua. 

And  this  constant  mischief  takes  place,  be  it  observed,  irre- 
spective of  inundation.  All  that  Florence,  Pisa,  and  Rome 
have  suffered  and  suffer  periodically"  from  floods  is  so  much 
mischief  added  to  that  of  increasing  maremmas,  spoiled  liar- 
borao^es,  and  lost  mountain-erround. 

There  is  yet  one  further  evil.  The  snow  on  the  bared  rock 
slips  lower  and  melts  faster;  snows  which  in  mossy  or  grass 
ground  would  have  lain  long,  and  furnished  steadily  flowing 
streams  far  on  into  summer,  fall  or  melt  from  the  bare  rock  in 
avalanche  and  flood,  and  spend  in  desolation  in  a  few  days 
what  would  have  been  nourishment  for  half  the  year.  And 
against  all  this  there  are  no  remedies  possible  in  any  sudden  or 
external  action.  It  is  the  law  of  the  Heaven  which  sends 
flood  and  food,  that  national  prosperity  can  only  be  achieved 
by  national  forethought  and  unity  of  purpose. 

In  the  year  1858  I  was  staying  the  greater  part  of  the  sum- 
mer at  Bellinzona,  during  a  drought  as  harmful  as  the  storms 
of  ten  years  later.  The  Ticino  sank  into  a  green  rivulet ;  and 
not  having  seen  the  right  way  to  deal  with  the  matter,  I  had 
many  a  talk  with  the  parroco  of  a  little  church  whose  tower  I 
was  drawing,  as  to  the  possibility  of  setting  his  peasants  to 
work  to  repair  the  embankment  while  the  river  was  low.  But 
the  good  old  priest  said,  sorrowfully,  the  peasants  were  too 
jealous  of  each  other,  that  no  one  would  build  anything  or 
protect  his  own  ground  for  fear  his  work  might  also  beneflt 
his  neighbors. 

But  the  people  of  Bellinzona  are  Swiss,  not  Italians.  I 
believe  the  Roman  and  Sienese  races,  in  different  ways,  posset-s 
qualities  of  strength  and  gentleness  far  more  precious  than 
the  sunshine  and  rain  upon  their  mountains,  and,  hitherto,  as 
cnielly  lost.  It  is  in  them  that  all  the  real  power  of  Italy 
still  lives  ;  it  is  only  by  them,  and   by  what  care,  and  provi- 


118  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1871. 

dence,  and  accordant  good-will  ever  be  found  in  them,  that  the 
work  is  to  be  done,  not  by  money  ;  though,  if  money  were  all 
that  is  needed,  do  we  in  England  owe  so  little  to  Italy  of 
delight  that  we  cannot  so  much  as  lend  her  spades  and  pick- 
axes at  her  need?  Would  she  trust  us?  Would  her  govern- 
ment let  us  send  over  some  engineer  officers  and  a  few  sappers 
and  miners,  and  bear,  for  a  time,  with  an  English  instead  of  a 
French  ''  occupation"  of  her  barrenest  hills  ? 

But  she  does  not  need  us.  Good  engineers  she  has,  and 
has  had  many  since  Leonardo  designed  the  canals  of  Lombardy. 
Agriculturists  she  has  had,  I  think,  among  her  gentlemen  a 
little  before  there  were  gentlemen  farmers  in  England ;  some- 
thing she  has  told  us  of  agriculture,  also,  pleasantly  by  the  reeds 
of  Mincio  and  among  the  apple-blossoms  wet  with  Arno.  Her 
streams  have  learned  obedience  before  now  :  Fonte  Branda  and 
the  Fountain  of  Joy  flow  at  Sienna  still ;  the  rivulets  that 
make  green  the  slopes  of  Casentino  may  yet  satisfy  true  men's 
thirst.  "  Where  is  the  money  to  come  from  ?"  Let  Italy  keep 
her  souls  pure,  and  she  will  not  need  to  alloy  her  florins.  The 
only  question  for  her  is  whether  still  the  mossy  rock  and  the 
"rivus  aquge"  are  "in  rotis"  or  rather  the  racecourse  and  the 
boulevard — the  curses  of  England  and  of  France. 

At  all  events,  if  any  one  of  the  Princes  of  Eome  will  lead, 
help  enough  will  follow  to  set  the  work  on  foot,  and  show  the 
peasants,  in  some  narrow  district,  what  can  be  done.  Take  any 
arid  piece  of  Apennine  towards  the  sources  of  the  Tiber ;  let 
"the  drainage  be  carried  along  the  hill-sides  away  from  the 
existing  water-courses ;  let  cisterns,  as  of  old  in  Palestine,  and 
larger  reservoirs,  such  as  we  now  can  build,  be  established  at 
every  point  convenient  for  arrest  of  the  streams ;  let  channels 
of  regulated  flow  be  established  from  these  over  the  tracts  that 
are  driest  in  summer ;  let  ramparts  be  carried,  not  along  the 
river  banks,  but  round  the  heads  of  the  ravines,  throwing  the 
water  aside  into  lateral  canals ;  then  terrace  and  support  the 
looser  soil  on  all  the  steeper  slopes  ;  and  the  entire  mountain 
side  may  be  made  one  garden  of  orange  and  vine  and  olive 
beneath ;  and  a  wide  blossoming  orchard  above ;  and  a  green 


1871.]  LETTERS    OS    KOMAX    INL'X  DATIONS.  119 

higliest  pasture  for  cattle,  and  flowers  for  bees — up  to  the  edge 
of  the  snows  of  spring. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

JoUN  RUSKIN. 

Oxford.  Feb.  3. 


[From  "The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  December  28,  1871.] 

THE  STREETS  OF  LONDON. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  have  been  every  day  on  the  point  of  writing  to  you 
since  your  notice,  on  the  18th,*  of  the  dirty  state  of  the  Lon- 
don streets,  to  ask  whetlier  any  of  your  readers  would  care  to 
know  how  such  matters  are  managed  in  my  neighborhood.  I 
was  obliged,  a  few  years  ago,  for  the  benefit  of  my  health,  to 
take  a  small  house  in  one  of  the  country  towns  of  Utopia ;  and 
though  I  was  at  first  disappointed  in  the  climate,  which  indeed 
is  no  better  than  our  own  (except  that  there  is  no  foul  marsh 
air),  I  found  my  cheerfulness  and  ability  for  work  greatly 
increased  by  the  mere  power  of  getting  exercise  pleasantly  close 
to  my  door,  even  in  the  worst  of  the  winter,  when,  though  I  have 
a  little  garden  at  the  back  of  my  house,  I  dislike  going  into  it, 
because  the  things  look  all  so  dead ;  and  find  my  walk  on  the 
whole  pleasanter  in  the  streets,  these  being  always  perfectly 
clean,  and  the  wood-carving  of  the  houses  prettier  than  much 
of  our  indoor  furniture.  But  it  was  about  the  streets  I  wanted 
to  tell  you.  The  Utopians  have  the  oddest  way  of  carrying 
out  things,  wlien  once  they  begin,  as  far  as  they  can  go ;  and 
it  occurred  to  them  one  dirty  December  long  since,  when  they, 
like  us,  had  only  crossing-sweepers,  that  they  might  just  as 
well  sweep  the  whole  of  the  street  as  the  crossings  of  it,  so 
that  they  might  cross  anywhere.     Of  course  that  meant  more 

*  Quite  unimportant.     It  simply  complained  of  the  condition  of  the 
streets. 


120  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1871. 

work  for  the  sweepers ;  but  the  Utopians  have  always  hands 
enough  for  whatever  work  is  to  be  done  in  the  open  air  ; — they 
aj^pointed  a  due  number  of  broonismen  to  every  quarter  of  the 
town ;  and  since  tlien,  at  any  time  of  the  year,  it  is  in  our  little 
town  as  in  great  Rotterdam  when  Doctor  Brown  saw  it  on  his 
journey  from  Norwich  to  Colon  in  1668,  "  th«  women  go  about 
in  white  slippers,"  which  is  pretty  to  see.*  Now,  Sir,  it 
would,  of  course,  be  more  difficult  to  manage  anything  like 
this  in  London,  because,  for  one  thing,  in  our  town  we  have  a 
rivulet  running  down  every  street  that  slopes  to  the  river ;  and 
besides,  because  you  have  coal-dust  and  smoke  and  what  not  to 
deal  with ;  and  the  habit  of  spitting,  which  is  worst  of  all — in 
Utopia  a  man  would  as  soon  vomit  as  spit  in  the  street  (or 
anywhere  else,  indeed,  if  he  could  help  it).  But  still  it  is  cer- 
tain we  can  at  least  anywhere  do  as  much  for  the  whole  street, 
as  we  have  done  for  the  crossing ;  and  to  show  that  we  can,  I 
f  mean,  on  1st  January  next,  to  take  three  street-sweepers  into 
constant  service ;  they  will  be  the  first  workpeople  I  employ 
with  the  interest  of  the  St.  George's  fund,  of  which  I  shall 
get  my  first  dividend  this  January ;  and,  whenever  I  can  get 
leave  from  the  police  and  inhabitants,  I  will  keep  my  three 
sweepers  steadily  at  work  for  eight  hours  a  day ;  and  I  hope 
soon  to  show  you  a  bit  of  our  London  streets  kept  as  clean  as 
the  deck  of  a  ship  of  the  line.f 

I  am.  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

John  Ruskin. 
December  27,  1871. 

*  Dr.  Edward  Browne,  the  son  of  the  author  of  the  "  Religio  Medici," 
Sir  Thomas  Browne.  Writing  to  his  father  from  Rotterdam,  in  1668,  he 
says:  "  The  cleanenesse  and  neatnesse  of  this  towne  is  so  new  unto  mee, 
that  it  affoordeth  great  satisfaction,  most  persons  going  about  the  streets  in 
white  slippers." — "  Life  and  Works  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne."  Pickering, 
1836.     Vol.  i.  p.  154. 

f  Mr.  Ruskin  was  as  good  as  his  word,  and  his  sweepers  were  at  work 
in  the  following  Januar}'. 


MISCELLANEOUS  LE^ITERS. 


IV. 

EDUCATION  FOR  EICH  AND  POOR. 

True  Education.    1868. 

The  Value  of  Lectures.    1874. 

The  Cradle  of  Art!    1876. 

St.  George's  Museum.    1875. 

The  Morality  of  Field  Sports.     1870. 

Drunkenness  and  Crime.     1871. 

Madness  and  Crime.     1872. 

Employment  for  the  Destitute  Poor  and  Criminal  Classes.    1868. 

Notes  on  the  General  Principles  of  Employment  for  the  Desti- 
tute AND  Criminal  Classes  (a  pamphlet).     1868. 

Blindness  and  Sight.    1879. 

The  Eagle's  Nest.    1879. 

Politics  in  Youth.     1879. 

"Act,  Act  in  the  Living  Present."    1873. 

"Laborare  est  Orare."    1874. 

A  Pagan  I^Iessage.     1878. 

The  Foundations  of  Chivalry. 

(Five  letters:  February  8,  10,  11,  and  12,  1877,  and  July  3,  1878.) 


IV. 

EDUCATION  FOR  RICH  AND  POOR. 


[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  January  31,  1868.] 

TRUE  EDUCATION* 

To  the  Editor  of  "  Tlie  PaU  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  The  letter  you  published  yesterday  from  a  parish 
schoolboy  of  "  Sixty  Years  Since"  at  Weary-faulds  (confirmed 
as  it  would  be  doubtless  in  all  practical  respects  by  testimony 
of  English  boys  educated  at  Waverley  Honour)  has  my  hearty 
sympathy ;  but  I  am  wearier  than  any  tenant  of  Weary-faulds 
of  seeing  this  subject  of  education  always  treated  as  if  "educa- 
tion" only  meant  teaching  children  to  write  or  to  cipher  or  to 
repeat  catechism.  You  know,  Sir,  as  you  have  shown  by  your 
comments  on  the  Bishop  of  Oxford's  last  speech  on  this  sub- 
ject, and  you  could  not  at  present  use  your  influence  more 
beneficially  than  by  farther  showing  that  the  real  education — 

*  The  PaU  Mall  Gazette  of  January  27  contained  a  leader  on  "  Compul- 
sory Education,"  and  that  of  January  29  one  upon  a  speech  of  the  Bishop 
of  Oxford  on  the  same  subject,  made  at  a  meeting  in  connection  with  the 
National  Society,  held  at  Tunbridge  Wells  on  the  preceding  day.  In  the 
Gazette  of  January  30  appeared  a  letter  referring  to  these  articles,  headed 
"Sixty  Years  Ago,"  and  signed  "One  who  has  walked  four  miles  to  the 
Parish  School."  It  described  the  writer's  early  home,  situate  in  some  low- 
land parish  north  of  the  Tweed,  and  divided  into  five  or  six  estates,  such 
as  "Whinny-hills"  and  "  Wcary-faulds."  the  lairds  of  which  were  shortly 
called  "  Wliinny"  or  "Weary"  after  their  properties.  In  this  primitive 
village,  where  supervision,  much  less  compulsion,  in  education  was  never 
heard  of,  "no  child  grew  up  without  learning  to  read,"  and  the  morals  of 
the  parish  were  on  the  whole  good;  the  children  qiuinelled,  but  did  not 
steal. — The  reader  will  remember  that  the  second  title  of  "Waverley"  is 
'"Tis  Sixty  Years  Since." 


124  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1874. 

the  education  which  alone  should  be  compulsory  —  means 
nothing  of  the  kind.  It  means  teaching  children  to  be  clean, 
active,  honest,  and  useful.  All  these  characters  can  be  taught, 
and  cannot  be  acquired  by  sickly  and  ill-dispositioned  children 
without  being  taught ;  but  they  can  be  untaught  to  any  extent, 
by  evil  habit  and  example  at  home.  Public  schools,  in  which 
the  aim  was  to  form  character  faithfully,  would  return  to  them 
in  due  time  to  their  parents,  worth  more  than  their  "  weight  in 
gold."  That  is  the  real  answer  to  the  objections  founded  on 
economical  difficulties.  Will  you  not  make  some  effort.  Sir, 
to  get  your  readers  to  feel  this  ?  I  am  myself  quite  sick  of 
saying  it  over  and  over  again  in  vain. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  KUSKIN. 
DeNMARK  Hill,  Jan.  31,  1868. 


[From  "  The  Glasgow  Herald,"  June  5, 1874.      Also  reprinted  in  "The  Times"  of  June 

6, 1874.J 

THE   VALUE  OF  LECTUBES* 

Rome,  2m  May,  1874. 
My  dear  Sir  :  I  have  your  obliging  letter,  but  am  com- 
pelled by  increase  of  work  to  cease  lecturing  except  at  Oxford 
— and  practically  there  also — for,  indeed,  I  find  the  desire  of 
audiences  to  be  audiences  only  becoming  an  entirely  pestilent 
character  of  the  age.  Everybody  wants  to  hear — nobody  to 
read — nobody  to  think ;  to  be  excited  for  an  hour — and,  if 
possible,  amused  ;  to  get  the  knowledge  it  has  cost  a  man  half 

*  This  letter  was  written  to  Mr.  Chapman,  of  the  Glasgow  Athenaeum 
Lecture  Committee,  in  reply  to  a  request  that  Mr.  Ruskin  would  lecture  at 
their  meetings  during  the  winter.  Writing  from  Oxford,  four  years  later, 
in  answer  to  a  similar  request,  Mr.  Ruskin  wrote  as  follows:  "Nothing 
can  advance  art  in  any  district  of  this  accursed  machine-and-devil  driven 
England  until  she  changes  her  mind  in  many  things,  and  my  time  for  talk- 
ing is  past. — Ever  faithfully  yours,  J.  Ruskin.  I  lecture  here,  but  only  ou 
the  art  of  the  past."    (Extract  given  in  the  Times,  Feb.  12,  1878.) 


1876.]  LETTERS   ON    EDUCATION.  125 

his  life  to  gatlier,  first  sweetened  up  to  make  it  palatable,  and 
then  kneaded  into  the  smallest  possible  pills — and  to  swallow 
it  homoeopathically  and  be  wise — this  is  the  passionate  desire 
and  hope  of  the  multitude  of  the  day. 

It  is  not  to  be  done.  A  living  comment  quietly  given  to 
a  class  on  a  book  they  are  earnestly  reading — this  kind  of  lec- 
ture is  eternally  necessary  and  wholesome ;  your  modern  fire- 
working,  smooth  -  downy  -  curry  -  and  -  strawbei*ry-ice-and-milk- 
punch-altogether  lecture  is  an  entirely  pestilent  and  abominable 
anity  ;  and  the  miserable  death  of  poor  Dickens,  when  he 
ight  have  been  writing  blessed  books  till  he  was  eighty,  but 
for  the  pestiferous  demand  of  the  mob,  is  a  very  solemn  warn- 
ing tqjia.aJl,  if  we  would  take  it.'^.       A" 

God  willing,  I  will  go  on  writing,  and  as  well  as  I  can. 
There  are  three  volumes  published  of  my  Oxford  lectures, f  in 
which  every  sentence  is  set  down  as  carefully  as  may  be.  If 
people  want  to  learn  from  me,  let  them  i-ead  them  or  my 
monthly  letter  Fors  Clavigera,  If  they  don't  care  for  these,  I 
don't  care  to  talk  to  them.  Tmly  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 


V 

mi 


[Date  and  place  of  publication  unknoT\-n.J 

THE  CRADLE  OF  ART!  % 

18th  Feb.  1876. 
My  dear  Sir  :  I  lose  a  frightful  quantity  of  time  because 
people  won't  read  what  I  ask  them  to  read,  nor  believe  any- 

*  The  evil  result  on  Dickens'  health  of  his  last  series  of  readings  at  St. 
James's  Hall,  in  the  early  part  of  1870,  scarcely  four  months  before  his 
death,  is  thus  noted  by  Mr.  Forster:  "  Little  remains  to  be  told  that  has  not 
in  it  almost  unmixed  sorrow  and  pain.  Hardly  a  day  passed,  while  the 
readings  went  on  or  after  they  closed,  unvisited  by  some  effect  or  other  of 
the  disastrous  excitement  consequent  on  them." — "Life  of  Charles  Dick- 
ens," vol.  iii.  p.  493. 

+  "  Aratra  Pcntalici."  "The  Eagle's  Nest";  and  cither  "  Yal  d'Arno" 
(Orpington,  1874)  or  "Lectures  on  Art  "  (Clarendon  Press,  1870), 

X  This  letter  was  in  answer  to  a  request  of  the  Sheffield  Society  of  Artists 
similar  to  that  replied  to  m  the  preceding  letter. 


126  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1875. 

thiiig  of  what  I  tell  them,  and  yet  ask  me  to  talk  whenever 
they  think  they  can  take  a  shilling  or  two  at  the  door  by  me. 
I  have  written  fifty  times,  if  once,  that  you  can't  have  art 
where  you  have  smoke ;  you  may  have  it  in  hell,  perhaps,  for 
the  Devil  is  too  clever  not  to  consume  his  own  smoke,  if  he 
wants  to.  But  you  will  never  have  it  in  Sheffield.  You  may 
learn  something  about  nature,  shrivelled,  and  stones,  and  iron ; 
and  what  little  you  can  see  of  that  sort,  I'm  going  to  try  and 
show  you.     But  pictures,  never. 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

John  Huskin. 

[f  for  no  other  reason,  no  artist  worth  sixpence  in  a  day 
would  live  in  Sheffield,  nor  would  any  one  who  cared  for  pic- 
tures— for  a  million  a  year. 


[From  "  The  Sheffield  Daily  Telegraph,"  September  7,  1875.] 

ST.    GEORGE'S  MUSEUM.'' 

Brantwood,  Coniston,  Lancashire. 
Mt  deak  Sir  :  I  am  obliged  by  your  note,  but  the  work  of 
the  St.  George's  Company  is  necessarily  distinct  from  all  other. 
My  "  museum"  may  be  perhaps  nothing  but  a  two-windowed 
garret.  But  it  w411  have  in  it  nothing  but  what  deserves  respect 
in  art  or  admiration  in  nature.  A  great  museum  in  the  present 
state  of  the  public  mind  is  simply  an  exhibition  of  the  possible 
modes  of  doing  wrong  in  art,  and  an  accumulation  of  uselessly 
multiplied  ugliness  in  misunderstood  nature.    Our  own  museum 

*  This  letter  was  written  in  answer  to  one  addressed  to  Mr.  Ruskin  by 
Mr.  W.  Bragge,  F.R.G.S.,  who,  having  read  in  "  Fors  Clavigera"  of  Mr. 
Buskin's  intention  to  found  the  St.  George's  Museum  at  Sheffield,  wrote  to 
inform  him  that  another  museum,  in  which  his  might  be  incorporated,  was 
already  in  course  of  building.  It  was  read  by  Mr.  Bragge  at  a  dinner 
which  followed  the  opening  of  Western  Park  to  the  public  on  September 
6,  1875. 


1870.]  LETTERS    ON    EDUCATION.  127 

at  Oxford  is  full  of  distorted  skulls,  and  your  Sheffield  iron- 
work department  will  necessarily  contain  the  most  barbaruus 
abortions  that  human  rudeness  hi'S  ever  produced  with  human 
lingers.  The  capitals  of  the  iron  shafts  in  any  railway  station, 
for  instance,  are  things  to  make  a  man  wish — for  shame  of  his 
species — that  he  had  been  born  a  dog  or  a  bee. 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 

P.S. — I  have  no  doubt  the  geological  department  will  be 
well  done,  and  my  poor  little  cabinets  will  enable  your  men  to 
use  it  to  better  advantage,  but  would  be  entirely  lost  if  united 
with  it. 


[From  "The  Dai^y  Telegraph,"  January  15, 1870.] 

THE  MORALITY  OF  FIELD  SPORTS. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sm  :  As,  thirty  years  ago,"^  I  publicly  expressed  a  strong 
opinion  on  the  subject  of  field  sports,  and  as  with  more  accu- 
rate knowledge  I  hold  the  same  opinion  still,  and  more  strongly 
— will  you  permit  me  to  place  the  controversy  between  your 
correspondentSjt  in  which  1  have  no  time  to  take  part,  on 
somewhat  clearer  grounds. 

*  In  various  parts  of  "  Modern  Painters. "  See  vol.  v.  p.  264.  "  I  wish, 
however,  the  reader  distinctly  to  understand  that  the  expressions  of  repro- 
bation of  field  sports  which  he  will  find  scattered  through  these  volumes 
.  .  .  .  refer  only  to  the  chase  and  the  turf;  that  is  to  say,  to  hunting, 
shooting,  and  horse-racing,  but  not  to  athletic  exercises.  I  have  just  as 
deep  a  respect  for  boxing,  wrestling,  cricketing,  and  rowing,  as  contempt 
of  all  the  various  modes  of  wasting  wealth,  time,  land,  and  energy  of  soul, 
which  have  been  invented  by  the  pride  and  selfishness  of  men,  in  order  to 
enable  them  to  be  healthy  in  uselessness,  and  get  quit  of  the  burdens  of 
their  own  lives,  without  condescending  to  make  themselves  serviceable  to 
others." 

t  The  correspondence  originated  as  follows:  In  the  Fortnif/htly  Reriew 
of  October,  1869,  appeared  an  article  against  fox-hunting  by  ^Ir.  E.  A. 
Freeman,  entitled,  "The  Morality  of  Field  Sports."  to  which  Mr.  Anthony 


128  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1870. 

Keprobation  of  fox-hunting  on  the  ground  of  cruelty  to  the 
fox  is  entirely  futile.  More  pain  is  caused  to  the  draught- 
horses  of  London  in  an  hour  by  avariciously  overloading  them, 
than  to  all  the  foxes  in  England  by  the  hunts  of  the  year  :  and 
the  rending  of  body  and  heart  in  human  death,  caused  by 
neglect,  in  our  country  cottages,  in  any  one  winter,  could  not 
be  equalled  by  the  death-pangs  of  any  quantity  of  foxes. 

The  real  evils  of  fox-hunting  are  that  it  wastes  the  time, 
misapplies  the  energy,  exhausts  the  wealth,  narrows  the  capacity, 
debases  the  taste,  and  abates  the  honor  of  the  upper  classes  of 
this  country ;  and  instead  of  keeping,  as  your  correspondent 
"  Forester"  supposes,  "  thousands  from  the  workhouse,"  it  sends 
thousands  of  the  poor,  both  there,  and  into  the  grave. 

The  athletic  training  given  by  fox-hunting  is  excellent ; 
and  such  training  is  vitally  necessary  to  the  upper  classes.  But 
it  ought  always  to  be  in  real  service  to  their  country ;  in 
personal  agricultural  labor  at  the  head  of  their  tenantry  ;  and 
in  extending  English  life  and  dominion  in  waste  regions,  against 
the  adverse  powers  of  nature.  Let  them  become  Captains  of 
Emigration ; — hunt  down  the  foxes  that  spoil  the  Yineyard  of 
the  World ;  and  keep  their  eyes  on  the  leading  hound,  in  Packs 
of  Men. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    EUSKLN.* 
DeNMARK^ILL,  JqLU.  14. 

Trollope^eplied  by  one  entitled  "The  Morality  of  Hunting,"  in  the  Fort- 
nighily  of  the  following  December.  Mr.  Freeman  then  rejoined  by  two 
letters  of  considerable  length,  addressed  to  the  editor  of  the  Daily  Telegraph 
(December  18  and  29),  in  whose  columns  some  discussion  of  the  matter  had 
already  been  carried  on,  whilst  one  of  its  leaders  had  strongly  supported 
Mr.  Freeman's  views.  Other  correspondence  on  the  subject  was  still 
appearing  in  the  Daily  Telegraph  from  day  to  day  at  the  time  Mr.  Ruskin 
wrote  the  present  letter. 

*  At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  Society  for  the  Prevention  of  Cruelty  to 
Animals,  Mr.  Ruskin  is  reported  {Daily  News,  July  11,  1877)  to  have  said 
that  "  as  he  was  somewhat  concerned  in  the  studies  of  the  scientific  world, 
it  might  be  thought  that  he  sympathized  in  the  resistance  offered,  not 
without  some  ground  of  reason,  to  some  of  the  more  enthusiastic  and,  he 
feared  in  some  respects,  exaggerated  and  sentimental  actions  of  the  society. 


871.]  LETTERS   OX   EDUCATION".  129 

[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  December  11,  1S71.] 

BIiUJyKE^'NESS  AND   CRIME. 

Vo  the  Editor  of  TJie  Daily  TeUrjraphr 

Sir  :  I  am  greatly  surprised  by  the  sHghtness  of  your  article 
■o-day  on  the  statistics  of  drunkenness  and  the  relative  statistics 
)f  crime.* 

The  tables  yon  liave  given,  if  given  only  in  that  form  by 
Professor  Leone  Levi,  are  anything  but  "  instructive."  Liquor 
8  not,  fgr  such  purpose,  to  be  measured  only  by  the  gallon, 
3Ut  by  the  gallon  with  accompanying  statement  of  strength. 

Crime  is  not  for  such  purpose  to  be  measured  by  the 
lumber  of  criminals,  but  by  the  number,  with  accompanying 
statement  of  the  crime  committed.  Drunkenness  very  slightly 
encourages  theft,  very  largely  encourages  murder,  and  univer- 
sally encourages  idleness,  which  is  not  a  crime  apparent  in  a 

He  pleaded  in  the  name  of  poor  animals  that  none  of  them  should  act  too 
much  on  the  feeling  of  pity,  or  without  making  a  thoroughly  judicial 
inquiry.  In  looking  at  the  report,  he  found  part  of  the  society's  admirable 
evidence  mixed  up  with  sentimental  tales  of  fiction  and  other  means  of 
exciting  mere  emotion,  which  had  caused  them  to  lose  power  with  those 
who  had  the  greatest  influence  in  the  prevention  of  the  -abusqe  which  Ihe 

iety  desired  to  check.  The  true  justice  of  their  cause  lay  in  the  relations 
which  men  had  had  with  animals  from  the  time  when  both  were  made. 
They  had  endeavored  to  prevent  cruelty  to  animals;  they  had  not  enough 
endeavored  to  promote  affection  for  animals.  He  thought  they  had  had 
too  much  to  do  in  the  police  courts,  and  not  enough  in  the  field  and  the 
cottage  garden.  As  one  who  was  especially  interested  in  the  education  of 
the  poor,  he  believed  that  he  could  not  educate  them  on  animals,  but  that 
ihe  could  educate  them  by  animals.  He  trusted  to  the  pets  of  children  for 
their  education  just  as  much  as  to  their  tutors.  He  rejoiced  in  the  separate 
organization  of  the  Ladies'  Committee,  and  looked  to  it  to  give  full  extent 
and  power  to  action  which  would  supersede  all  their  expensive  and  painful 
disputable  duties.  Without  perfect  sympathy  with  the  animals  around 
them,  no  gentleman's  education,  no  Christian  education,  C(Mild  be  of  any 
possible  use.  In  concluding,  he  pleaded  for  an  expansion  of  the  protection 
extended  by  the  society  to  wild  birds." 

*  A  short  leader  to  which  special  reference  is  unnecessary. 


130  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTEKS.  [1874. 

tabular  form.  But,  whatever  results  might,  even  by  such  more 
accurate  statement,  be  attainable,  are  not  material  to  the 
question  at  issue.  Drunkenness  is  not  the  cause  of  crime  in 
any  case.  It  is  itself  crime  in  every  case.  A  gentleman  will 
not  knock  out  his  wife's  brains  when  he  is  drunk ;  but  it  is 
nevertheless  his  duty  to  remain  sober. 

Much  more  is  it  his  duty  to  teach  his  peasantry  to  remain 
sober,  and  to  furnish  them  with  sojourn  more  pleasant  than 
the  pothouse,  and  means  of  amusement  less  circumscribed  than 
the  pot.  And  the  encouragement  of  drunkenness,  for  the  sake 
of  the  profit  on  sale  of  drink,  is  certainly  one  of  the  most 
criminal  methods  of  assassination  for  money  hitherto  adopted 
by  the  bravos  of  an  age  or  country. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

John  Ruskin. 
Denmark  Hill,  Dec.  9. 


[From  "The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  November 4, 1872.  (Also  reprinted  in  "  Fora Clavigera," 
Letter  48,  p.  286,  vol.  iv.,  1874).] 

MADNESS  AND   CRIME. 

To  tJie  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazetter 

Sir  :  Towards  the  close  of  the  excellent  article  on  the 
Taylor  trial  in  your  issue  for  October  31  *  you  say  that  people 
never  will  be,  nor  ought  to  be,  persuaded,  "  to  treat  criminals 
simply  as  vermin  which  they  destroy,  and  not  as  men  who  are 
to  be  punished."  Certainly  not.  Sir!  Who  ever  talked,  or 
thought,  of  regarding  criminals  '-simply"  as  anything  (or 
innocent  people  either,  if  there  be  any)  1  But  regarding 
criminals  complexly  and  accurately,  they  are  partly  men,  partly 
vermin;  what  is  human  in  them  you  must  punish — what  is 
vermicular,  abolish.  Anything  between — if  you  can  find  it — 
I  wish  you  joy  of,  and  hope  you  may  be  able  to  preserve  it  to 

*  The  trial  of  Taylor  was  for  murder,  and  ended  in  his  acquittal  ou  the 
ground  of  insanity. 


1868. J  LETTERS   ON   EDUCATION.  131 

society.  Insane  persons,  horses,  dogs,  or  cats  become  vermin 
when  thev  become  (lani2,-erous.  I  am  sorry  for  darlinjr  Fido, 
but  there  is  no  question  about  wliat  is  to  be  done  with  liim. 

Yet,  I  assure  you,  Sir,  insanity  is  a  tender  point  with  me. 
One  of  my  best  friends  has  just  gone  mad  ;  and  all  the  rest 
say  I  am  mad  myself.  But  if  ever  I  murder  anybody — and, 
indeed,  tliere  are  numbers  of  people  I  should  like  to  murder — 
I  won't  say  that  I  ought  to  be  hanged  ;  for  I  think  nobody  but 
a  bishop  or  a  bank-director  can  ever  be  rogue  enough  to  deserve 
banging ;  but  I  particularly,  and  with  all  that  is  left  me  of 
what  I  imagine  to  be  sound  mind,  request  that  I  may  be 
immediately  shot. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.    KUSKIN. 

Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford, 
November  3. 


[From  "The  Daily  Telegraph,"  December  26,  1868.1 

EMPLOYMENT  FOR  TEE  DESTITUTE  POOR  AND   CRIMINAL 

CLASSES. 

To  the  Editor  of  "  TJie  Daily  Telegraph." 

Sir  :  Your  admirable  leader  of  to-day  *  will  do  great  good ; 
but  it  will  do  more  if  you  complete  it  by  pointing  out  the  chief 
reason  for  the  frequent  failure  of  almsgiving  in  accomplishing 
any  real  benefit  to  the  poor.  Ko  almsgiving  of  money  is  so 
.helpful  as  almsgiving  of  care  and  thought ;  the  giving  of 
money  without  thought  is  indeed  continually  mischievous  ;  but 
the  invective  of  the  economist  against  ^discriminate  charity 
is  idle,  if  it  be  not  coupled  with  pleading  for  discriminate 
charity,  and,  above  all,  for  that  charity  which  discei'ns  the  uses 
that  people  may  be  put  to,  and  hel})s  them  by  setting  them  to 
work  in  those  services.  That  is  the  help  beyond  all  others; 
find  out  how  to  make  useless  people  nsefiil.  and  let  them  earn 

*  A  Christmas  article  on  Cliai'ity. 


fl 

132  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1868. 

their  money  instead  of  begging  it.  Few  are  so  feeble  as  to  be 
incapable  of  all  occupation,  none  so  faultful  but  that  occupation, 
well  chosen,  and  kindly  compelled,  will  be  medicine  for  them 
in  soul  and  body.  I  have  lately  drawn  up  a  few  notes  for 
private  circulation  on  possible  methods  of  employment  for  the 
poor."^  The  reasons  which  weighed  with  me  in  not  publishing 
them  have  now  ceased  to  exist ;  and  in  case  you  should  think 
the  paper  worth  its  room  in  your  columns,  and  any  portion  of 
it  deserving  your  ratification,  I  send  it  you  herewith,  and 
remain  your  faithful  servant, 

J.    RUSKIN. 

Denmakk  Hill,  S.E.,  Dec.  34. 


NOTES   ON  THE  GENERAL  PRINCIPLES   OF  EMPLOYMENT 
FOR  THE  DESTITUTE  AND   CRIMINAL    CLASSES 

[For  Private  Circulation  only.    1868.     (Pp.  15,  including  the  title-page.    Printed   by 
Strange  ways  &  Walden,  Castle  Street,  Leicester  Square. )  t] 

The  first  great  fact  on  which  all  wise  and  enduring  legisla- 
tion respecting  labor  must  be  founded,  is,  that  the  character  of 
men  depends  more  on  their  occupations  than  on  any  teaching 
we  can  give  them,  or  principles  with  which  w^e  can  imbue 
them. 

The  employment  forms  the  habits  of  body  and  mind,  and 
these  are  the  constitution  of  the  man — the  greater  part  of  his 
moral   or  persistent   nature,  whatever   effort,   under    special 

*  See  the  following  pages. 

f  There  were  two  editions  of  this  pamphlet.  The  first  was  entitled 
"First  Notes  on  the  General  Principles  of  Employment  for  the  Destitute 
and  Criminal  Classes.  By  John  Ruskin,  A.M.  For  private  circulation 
only.  1868"  (pp.  11,  including  the  title-page.  London:  Strangeways  & 
Walden,  printers,  Castle  Street,  Leicester  Square).  Mr.  Ruskin  enclosed 
the  second  edition  to  the  Daily  Telegraph,  where  almost  the  whole  of  the 
pamphlet  was  reprinted.  The  differences  between  the  two  editions  con- 
sisted only  in  one  or  two  additions  in  the  second  (see  below,  pages  197  and 
202,  notes).  ♦ 


1868.1  LETTERS   ON   EDUCATION.  133 

excitement,  he  may  make  to  change  or  overcome  them.  Em- 
ployment is  tlie  half,  and  the  primal  half,  of  education — it  is 
the  warp  of  it ;  and  the  fineness  or  the  endurance  of  all  subse- 
quently woven  pattern  depends  wholly  on  its  straightness  and 
Btrength.  And  whatever  difficulty  there  may  be  in  tracing 
through  past  history  the  remoter  connections  of  event  and 
cause,  one  chain  of  sequence  is  always  clear :  the  formation, 
namely,  of  the  character  of  nations  by  their  employments,  and 
the  determination  of  their  final  fate  by  their  character.  The 
moment  and  the  first  direction  of  circumstances,  of  decisive 
revolutions,  often  depend  on  accident ;  but  their  perr-istcnt 
course,  and  their  consequences,  depend  wholly  on  the  nature 
of  the  people.  The  passing  of  the  Keform  Bill  by  the  late 
English  Parliament'^  may  have  been  more  or  less  accidental: 
the  results  of  the  measure  now  rest  on  the  character  of  the 
English  people,  as  it  has  been  developed  by  their  recent  inter- 
ests, occupations,  and  habits  of  life.  Whether  as  a  body,  they 
employ  their  new  powers  for  good  or  evil  will  depend  not  on 
their  facilities  for  knowledge,  nor  even  on  the  general  intelli- 
gence they  may  possess,  but  on  the  number  of  persons  among 
them  whom  wholesome  employments  have  rendered  familiar 
with  the  duties,  and  temperate  in  their  estimate  of  the  promises 
of  life. 

But  especially  in  passing  laws  respecting  the  treatment  or 
employment  of  improvident  and  more  or  less  vicious  persons 
it  is  to  be  remembered  that  as  men  are  not  to  be  made  heroes 
by  an  act  of  heroism,  but  nmst  be  brave  before  they  can  per- 
form it,  so  they  are  not  made  villains  by  the  commission  of  a 
crime,  but  were  villains  before  they  committed  it :  and  that 
the  right  of  public  interference  with  their  conduct  begins  when 
;-  they  begin  to  corrupt  themselves,  not  merely  at  the  moment 
when  they  have  proved  themselves  hopelessly  corrupt. 

All  measures  of  reformation  are  effective  in  exact  propor- 
tion to  their  timeliness :  partial  decay  may  be  cut  away  and 
cleansed ;   incipient    error    corrected ;    but    there    is  a   point 

*  The  reform  bill  of  1867.     The  late  parliament  had  been  dissolved  on 
November  11,  and  the  new  one  had  just  sat  (December  10,  1868). 


134  MISCELLAiTEOUS   LETTERS.  [1868. 

at  whicli  corruption  can  no  more  be  stayed,  nor  wandering 
recalled  ;  it  lias  been  the  manner  of  modern  pliilantliropy  to 
remain  passive  until  that  precise  j^eriod,  and  to  leave  the  rich 
to  perish  and  the  foolish  to  stray,  while  it  exhausted  itself  in 
frantic  exertions  to  raise  the  dead  and  reform  the  dust. 

The  recent  direction  of  a  great  weight  of  public  opinion 
against  capital  punishment  is,  I  think,  the  sign  of  an  awaken- 
ing perception  that  punishment  is  the  last  and  worst  instru- 
ment in  the  hands  of  the  legislature  for  the  prevention  of 
crime. 

The  true  instruments  of  reformation  are  employment  and 
reward — not  23unishment.  Aid  the  willing,  honor  the  vir- 
tuous, and  compel  the  idle  into  occupation,  and  there  will  be 
no  need  for  the  compelling  of  any  into  the  great  and  last  indo- 
lence of  death.  The  beginning  of  all  true  reformation  among 
the  criminal  classes  depends  on  the  establishment  of  institu- 
tions for  their  active  employment,  while  their  criminality  is 
still  unripe,  and  their  feelings  of  self-respect,  capacities  of 
affection,  and  sense  of  justice  not  altogether  quenched.  That 
those  who  are  desirous  of  employment  should  be  always  able 
to  find  it,  will  hardly,  at  the  present  day,  be  disputed ;  but 
that  those  who  are  undesirous  of  employment  should  of  all 
persons  be  the  most  strictly  compelled  to  it,  the  public  are 
hardly  yet  convinced.  If  the  damage  of  the  principal  thorough- 
fares in  their  capital  city,  and  the  multiplication  of  crimes 
more  ghastly  than  ever  yet  disgraced  a  nominal  civilization,  do 
not  convince  them,  they  will  not  have  to  wait  long  before  they 
receive  sterner  lessons.  For  our  neglect  of  the  lower  orders 
has  reached  a  point,  at  which  it  begins  to  bear  its  necessary 
fruit,  and  every  day  makes  the  harvest  darker  and  more  sure."^ 

The  general  principles  by  which  employment  should  be 
regulated  may  be  briefly  stated  as  follows : 

1.  There  being  three  great  classes  of  mechanical  powers  at 
our  disposal,  namely,  {a)  vital  muscular  power;  (h)  natural 
mechanical  power  of  wind,  water,  and  electricity ;  and  (e)  arti- 

*  The  Daily  Telegraph  reprinted  the  pamphlet  from  this  point  to  the 
end. 


1868.]  LETTERS    OX    EDUCATION".  135 

ficially  produced  mechanical  power ;  it  is  tlie  first  principle  of 
economy  to  use  all  available  vital  power  first,  then  the  inex- 
pensiv^e  natural  i"<»rces,  and  only  at  last  to  have  recourse  to  arti- 
ficial power.  And  this,  because  it  is  always  better  for  a  man 
to  work  with  his  own  liands  to  feed  and  cluthe  himself,  than 
to  stand  idle  while  a  machine  w<^rks  for  him  ;  and  if  he  camiot 
by  all  the  labor  healthily  possible  to  him,  feed  and  clothe  him- 
self, then  it  is  better  to  use  an  inexpensive  machine — as  a  wind- 
mill or  water-mill — than  a  costly  one  like  a  steam-engine,  so 
long  as  we  have  natural  force  enough  at  our  disposal.  Whereas 
at  present  we  continually  hear  economists  regret  that  the 
water-powers  of  the  cascades  or  streams  of  a  country  should  be 
lost,  but  hardly  ever  that  the  nmscular  power  of  its  idle  inhab_ 
itants  should  be  lost ;  and,  again,  we  see  vast  districts,  as  the 
south  of  Provence,  where  a  strong  wind^  blows  steady  all  day 
long  for  six  days  out  of  seven  throughout  the  year,  without 
a  wind-mill,  while  men  are  continually  employed  a  hundred 
miles  to  the  north,  in  digging  fuel  to  obtain  artificial  power. 

But  the  principal  point  of  all  to  be  kept  in  view  is  that  in 
every  idle  arm  and  shoulder  throughout  the  country  there  is 
a  certain  quantity  of  force,  equivalent  to  the  force  of  so  much 
fuel ;  and  that  it  is  mere  insane  waste  to  dig  for  coal  for  our 
force,  while  the  vital  force  is  unused ;  and  not  only  unused, 
but,  in  being  so,  corrupting  and  polluting  itself.  We  waste 
our  coal  and  spoil  our  humanity  at  one  and  the  same  instant. 
Therefore,  whenever  there  is  an  idle  arm,  always  save  coal 
with  it,  and  the  stores  of  England  will  last  all  the  longer. 
And  precisely  the  same  argument  answers  the  common  one 
about  ''  taking  employment  out  of  the  hands  of  the  industrious 
laborer."  Why,  what  is  "  employment "  but  the  putting  out 
of  vital  force  instead  of  mechanical  force?    We  are  continually 

*  In  order  fully  to  utilize  this  natural  power,  we  only  require 
machinery  to  turn  the  variable  into  a  constant  velocity — no 
insurmountable  difficulty.! 

f  This  note  was  not  contained  in  the  first  edition  of  the  pamphlet,  and 
was  not  reprinted  by  the  Daily  Telegraph. 


136  MISCELLx\.XEOUS    LETTERS.  [1868. 

in  searcli  of  means  of  strength — to  pull,  to  hammer,  to  fetch, 
to  carry ;  we  waste  our  future  resources  to  get  power,  while 
we  leave  all  the  living  fuel  to  burn  itself  out  in  mere  pes- 
tiferous breath  and  production  of  its  variously  noisome  forms 
of  ashes !  Clearly,  if  we  want  fire  for  force,  we  w^ant  men  for 
force  first.  The  industrious  hands  inxtst  have  so  much  to  do 
that  they  can  do  no  more,  or  else  we  need  not  use  machines  to 
help  them  :  then  use  the  idle  hands  first.  Instead  of  dragging 
petroleum  with  a  steam-engine,  put  it  on  a  canal,  and  drag  it 
with  human  arms  and  shoulders.  Petroleum  cannot  possibly 
be  in  a  hurry  to  arrive  anywhere.  We  can  always  order  that 
and  many  other  things  time  enough  before  we  want  it.  So 
the  carriage  of  everything  which  does  not  spoil  by  keeping 
may  most  wdiolesomely  and  safely  be  done  by  water-traction 
and  sailing  vessels,  and  no  healthier  work  nor  better  discipline 
can  men  be  put  to  than  such  active  porterage. 

2.  In  employing  all  the  muscular  power  at  our  disposal,  we 
are  to  make  the  employments  we  choose  as  educational  as  pos- 
sible. For  a  wholesome  human  employment  is  the  first  and 
best  method  of  education,  mental  as  well  as  bodily.  A  man 
taught  to  plough,  row  or  steer  well,  and  a  woman  taught  to 
cook  properly  and  make  dress  neatly,  are  already  educated  in 
many  essential  moral  habits.  Labor  considered  as  a  discipline 
has  hitherto  been  thought  of  only  for  criminals ;  but  the  real 
and  noblest  function  of  labor  is  to  prevent  crime,  and  not  to 
be  7?(^formatory  but  Forniatory. 

3.  The  third  great  principle  of  employment  is,  that  when- 
ever there  is  pressure  of  poverty  to  be  met,  all  enforced  occu- 
pation should  be  directed  to  the  production  of  useful  articles 
only,  that  is  to  say,  of  food,  of  simple  clothing,  of  lodging,  or 
of  the  means  of  conveying,  distributing,  and  preserving  these. 
It  is  yet  little  understood  by  economists,  and  not  at  all  by  the 
public,  that  the  employment  of  persons  in  a  useless  business 
cannot  relieve  ultimate  distress.  The  money  given  to  employ 
riband-makers  at  Coventry  is  merely  so  much  money  with- 
drawn from  what  would  have  employed  lace-makers  at  Iloni- 
ton,  or  makers  of  something  else,  as  useless,  elsewhere.     We 


18G8.]  LETTERS   ON    EDUCATION.  137 

///  >i!<t  spend  our  money  in  some  way,  at  some  time,  and  it  can- 
not at  any  time  be  spent  without  employing  somebody.  If 
we  gamble  it  away,  the  person  who  wins  it  must  spend  it ;  if 
we  lose  it  in  a  railroad  speculation,  it  has  gone  into  some  one 
else's  pockets,  or  merely  gone  to  pay  navvies  for  making  a  use- 
less embankment,  instead  of  to  pay  riband  or  button  makers 
fci-  making  useless  ribands  or  buttons;  we  cannot  lose  it 
(unless  by  actually  destroying  it)  without  giving  employment 
of  some  kind,  and  therefore,  whatever  quantity  of  money 
exists,  the  relative  quantity  of  employment  must  some  day 
come  out  of  it ;  but  the  distress  of  the  nation  signifies  that  the 
employments  given  have  produced  nothing  that  will  support 
it-  existence.  Men  cannot  live  on  ribands,  or  buttons,  or  vel- 
vet, or  by  going  quickly  from  place  to  place ;  and  every  coin 
spent  in  useless  ornament,  or  useless  motion,  is  so  much  with- 
drawn from  the  national  means  of  life.  Whereas  every  coin 
spent  in  cultivating  ground,  in  repairing  lodgings,  in  making 
necessary  and  good  roads,  in  preventing  danger  by  sea  or  land, 
and  in  carriage  of  food  or  fuel  where  they  are  required,  is  so 
much  absolute  and  direct  gain  to  the  whole  nation.  To  cul- 
tivate land  round  Coventry  makes  living  easier  at  Honiton, 
and  every  house  well  built  in  Edinburgh  makes  lodgings 
cheaper  in  Glasgow  and  London. 

•ith,  and  lastly.  Since  for  every  idle  person  some  one  else 
nmst  be  woi'king  somewhere  to  provide  him  with  clothes  and 
f'M>d,  and  doing  therefore  double  the  quantity  of  work  that 
would  be  enough  for  his  own  needs,  it  is  only  a  matter  of  pure 
justice  to  compel  the  idle  person  to  work  for  his  maintenance 
himself.  The  conscription  has  been  used  in  many  countries 
Im  take  away  laborers  who  supported  their  families  from  their 
u>eful  work,  and  maintain  them  for  purposes  chiefly  of  mili- 
tary display  at  public  expense.  Since  this  had  been  long 
endured  by  the  most  civilized  nations,  let  it  not  be  thought 
that  they  would  not  much  more  gladly  endure  a  conscription 
which  should  seize  only  the  vicious  and  idle  already  living  by 
criminal  procedures  at  the  public  expense,  and  which  should 
discipline  and  educate  them  to  labor,  which  would  not  only 


138  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTEKS.  [186S. 

maintain  themselves,  but  be  serviceable  to  the  commonwealth. 
The  question  is  simj^ly  this  :  we  must  feed  the  drunkard, 
vagabond,  and  thief.  But  shall  we  do  so  by  letting  them  rob 
us  of  their  food,  and  do  no  work  for  it ;  or  shall  we  give  them 
their  food  in  appointed  quantity,  and  enforce  their  doing  work 
which  shall  be  worth  it,  and  wdiich,  in  process  of  time,  will 
redeem  their  own  characters,  and  make  them  happy  and  ser- 
viceable members  of  society  ?  * 

The  different  classes  of  work  for  which  bodies  of  men 
could  be  consistently  organized  might  ultimately  become 
numerous ;  these  following  divisions  of  occupation  may  at  once 
be  suggested. 

1.  Road -making. — Good  roads  to  be  made  wdierever 
needed,  and  kept  in  constant  repair;  and  the  annual  loss  on 
unfrequented  roads  in  spoiled  horses,  strained  wheels,  and 
time,  done  away  with. 

2.  Bringing  in  of  Waste  Land. — All  waste  lands  not  neces- 
sary for  public  health,  to  be  made  accessible  and  gradually  re- 
claimed. 

3.  Harbor-Making. — The  deficiencies  of  safe  or  convenient 
harborage  in  our  smaller  ports  to  be  remedied  ;  other  harbors 
built  at  dangerous  points  of  coast,  and  a  disciphned  body  of 
men  always  kept  in  connection  with  the  pilot  and  lifeboat  ser- 
vices. There  is  room  for  every  order  of  intelligence  in  this 
work,  and  for  a  large  body  of  superior  officers. 

4.  Porterage. — All  heavy  goods  not  requiring  speed  in 
transit,  to  be  carried  (under  preventive  duty  on  transit  by  rail- 
road) by  canal  boats,  employing  men  for  draught,  and  the 
merchant  shipping  service  extended  by  sea ;  so  that  no  ships 
may  be  wrecked  for  want  of  hands,  while  there  are  idle  ones 
in  mischief  on  shore. 

5.  Repair  of  Buildings. — A  body  of  men  in  various  trades 
to  be  kept  at  the  disposal  of  the  authorities  in  every  large 
town  for  consistent  repair  of  buildings,  especially  the  houses 
of  the  poorer  orders,  who,  if  no  such  provision  were  made, 

*  Here  the  first  edition  of  the  pamphlet  ends;  the  remaining  sentences 
being  contained  in  the  second  edition  only. 


1879. J  LETTERS   ON    EDUCATION.  130 

could  not  employ  workmen  on  their  own  houses,  but  wuuld 
simply  live  with  rent  walls  and  roofs. 

6.  Dress-making. — Substantial  dress,  of  standard  material 
and  kind,  strong  shoes,  and  stout  bedding,  to  be  manufactured 
for  the  poor,  so  as  to  render  it  unnecessary  for  them,  unless 
by  extremity  of  improvidence,  to  wear  cast  clothes,  or  be  with- 
out sutiiciency  of  clothing. 

7.  Works  of  Art. — Schools  to  be  established  on  thoroughly 
sound  principles  of  manufacture  and  use  of  materials,  and  with 
simple  and,  for  given  periods,  unalterable  modes  of  work ; 
first  in  ])ottery,  and  embracing  gradually  metal  work,  sculi> 
ture,  and  decorative  painting ;  the  two  points  insisted  upon, 
in  distinction  from  ordinary  connnercial  establishments,  being 
perfectness  of  material  to  the  utmost  attainable  degree;  and 
the  production  of  everything  by  hand-work,  for  the  special 
purpose  of  developing  personal  power  and  skill  in  the  work- 
man. 

The  two  last  departments,  and  some  subordinate  branches 
of  the  others,  would  include  the  service  of  women  and  children. 


[From  "The  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,"  conducted  by  the  Young  Men's  Association,  Clapham 
Congregational  Church.    September,  1879.     Vol.  iii..  No.  12,  p.  242.] 


BLINDNESS  AND   SIGHT* 

Brantwood,  Contston,  Lancashire, 

\Sth  July,  1879. 

My  dear  Sir  :  The  reason  I  never  answered  was — I  now 
find — the  difficulty  of  explaining  my  fixed  principle  never  to 
join  in  any  invalid  charities.  All  the  foolish  world  is  ready  to 
help  in  theia ;  and  will  spend  large  incomes  in  trying  to  make 
idiots  think,  and  the  blind  read,  but  will  leave  the  nol)lest 
intellects  to  go  to  the  Devil,  and  the  brightest  eyes  to  remain 

*  This  letter  was  sent  by  Mr.  Ruskin  to  the  Secretary  of  tlie  Protestant 
Blind  Pension  Society  in  answer  to  an  application  for  subscriptions  which 
Mr.  Ruskin  had  mislaid,  and  thus  left  unanswered. 


140  MISCELLAIfEOUS   LETTERS.  [1879. 

spiritually  blind  forever !     All  my  work  is  to  help  those  who 
have  eves  and  see  not. 

Ever  faithfully  yours,  J.  Kuskin. 
Tnos.  PococK,  Esq. 

I  must  add  that,  to  my  mind,  the  prefix  of  "  Protestant " 
to  your  society's  name  indicates  far  stonier  blindness  than  any 
it  will  relieve. 


[From  "The  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,"  October,  1879,  Vol.  iv.,  No.  1,  p.  12.] 

THE  EAGLE'S  NEST* 
To  the  Editor  of  "  The  T.  M.  A.  Magazine:' 

My  DE^it  Sm  :  There  is  a  mass  of  letters  on  my  table  this 
morning,  and  1  am  not  quite  sure  if  the  "Y.  M.  A.  Magazine," 
among  them,  is  -the  magazine  which  yours  of  the  15th  speaks 
of  as  "  enclosed  ;"  but  you  are  entirely  welcome  to  print  my 
letter  about  BHnd  Asylums  anywhere,  and  if  in  the  "  Y.  M.  A." 
I  should  be  glad  to  convey  to  its  editor,  at  the  same  time,  my 
thanks  for  the  article  on  "  Growing  Old,"  Vvhich  has  not  a  little 
comforted  me  this  inorning — and  my  modest  recommendation 
that,  by  way  of  antidote  to  the  No.  III.  paper  on  the  Sun,  he 
should  reproduce  the  104th,  115th,  and  llGth  paragraphs  of 
my  "  Eagle's  Nest,"  closing  them  with  this  following  sentence 
from  the  12th  Book  of  the  Laws  of  Plato,  dictating  the  due 
time  for  the  sittings  of  a  Parliament  seeking  righteous  policy 
(and  composed,  they  may  note  farther,  for  such  search,  of 
Young  Men  and  Old) : 

ixddrt/'^   jLiev    rjudpai   6vXXey6f.iBvo^    ic,   dvdyK7}Z   dit    ofjOpov 
jile'xpi    7t£p   dv   ?'/Xio<i   dvi6xv- 

Ever  faithfully  yours,  J.  Puskin. 
Braktwood  Coniston,  Lancashire,  August  ITtli,  1879. 

*  Tlie^articleon  "  Growing  Old"  (Y.  M.  A.,  August,  1879)  was  "  a  study 
from  tlie poets"  on  happiness  in  old  age;  that  upon  the  sun,  contained  in 
the  same  number  of  the  magazine,  dealt  with  the  spots  in  the  sun,  and  the 
various  scientific  opinions  about  them;  the  paragraphs  reprinted  from  the 
"Eagle's  Nest"  are  upon  the  sun  as  the  Light,  and  Health,  and  Guide  of 
Life. 


1873.]  LETTERS   OX    EDUCATIOX.  141 

[From  "The  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,"  November,  1879,  Vol.  iv.,  No.  2,  p.  36.1 

POLITICS   IX    TO  U  TIL 
To  the  Editor  of  ''  ihe  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine." 

My  DEAR  Sir:  I  am  lieartily  obliged  by  your  publication 
of  those  pieces  of  "  Eagle's  Nest,"  and  generally  interested  in 
your  Magazine,  papers  on  politics  excepted.  Young  men  have 
no  business  with  politics  at  all ;  and  when  tlie  time  is  come 
for  them  to  have  opinions,  they  will  find  all  political  parties 
resolve  themselves  at  last  into  two — that  which  holds  with 
Solomon,  that  a  rod  is  for  the  fool's  back,*  and  that  which 
holds  with  the  fool  himself,  that  a  crown  is  for  his  Lead,  a 
vote  for  his  mouth,  and  all  the  universe  for  his  belly. 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

(Signed)         J.  Ruskin. 

The  song  on  ''  Life's  Mid-day"  is  very    beautiful,   except 
the  third  stanza.     The  river  of  God  will  one  day  sweep  down 
the  great  city,  not  feed  it.f 
Sheffield,  October  Idt/i,  1879. 


[Fro:n  the  "  New  Year's  Address  and  Messages  to  Blackfriars  Bible  Class. 
Aberdeen,  1873.] 

"ACT,  ACT  IX  THE  LIVING   PRESENTr % 

Corpus  Christi  College.  Oxford, 
Christmas  Eve,  72. 
My'  DEAR  Sir  :  I  am  always  much  interested  in  any  effort 
such  as  you  are  making  on  the  part  of  the  laity. 

*  Proverbs  xxvi.  3,  and  x.  13. 

f  The  following  arc  liie  lines  specially  alluded  to: 

Shall  the  strong  full-flowing  river,  bearing  on  its  mighty  breast 

Half  the  wealth  of  .some  proud  nation,  precious  spoils  of  East  and  West, 

Shall  it  mourn  its  mountain  cradle  and  its  infant  heathery  bed, 

All  its  youthful  songs  and  dances,  as  ndown  the  hills  it  sped. 

When  by  it  in  yon  great  city  half  a  million  mouths  are  fed  ? 

[Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,  October,  1879.1 

X  This  and  the  two  following  letters  were  originally  printed  in  different 
annual   numbers  of  the   above-named  publication,    to   whose  editor  (Mr. 


142  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [187^. 

If  you  care  to  give  your  class  a  word  directly  from  me, 
say  to  them  that  they  will  find  it  well,  throughout  life,  never 
to  trouble  themselves  about  what  they  ought  not  to  do,  but 
about  what  they  ought  to  do.  The  condemnation  given  from 
the  judgment  throne — most  solemnly  described — is  all  for 
the  midones  and  not  for  the  donesT'  People  are  perpetually 
afraid  of  doing  wrong ;  but  unless  they  are  doing  its  reverse 
energetically,  they  do  it  all  day  long,  and  the  degree  does 
not  matter.  The  Commandments  are  necessarily  negative, 
because  a  new  set  of  positive  ones  would  be  needed  for  every 
person  :  while  the  negatives  are  constant. 

But  Christ  sums  them  all  into  two  rigorous  positions,  and 
the  first  position  for  young  people  is  active  and  attentive 
kindness  to  animals,  supposing  themselves  set  by  God  to  feed 
His  real  sheep  and  ravens  before  the  time  comes  for  doing 
either  figuratively.  There  is  scarcely  any  conception  left  of 
the  character  which  animals  and  birds  might  have  if  kindly 
treated  in  a  wild  state. 

Make  your  young  hearers  resolve  to  be  honest  in  their 
work  in  this  Kfe. — Heaven  will  take  care  of  them  for  the  other. 

Truly  yours, 

John  Euskin. 


[From  "New  Year's  Address  and  Messages  to  Blackfriars  Bible  Class." 
Aberdeen,  1874.] 

"LABORARE   EST   ORAREr 

Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford, 

December,  1873. 
My  DEAR  Sir  :  I  should  much  like  to  send  your  class  some 
message,  but  have  no  time  for  anything  I  like. 

My  own  constant  cry  to  all  Bible  readers  is  a  very  simple 

John  Leith,  75  Crown  Street,  Aberdeen)  they  were  addressed.  Amongst 
the  "messages"  contained  in  them  are  some  from  Mr.  Gladstone  and 
others. 

*  See  the  tenth  of  Mr.    Ruskin's  letters  on  the  Lord's  Prayer,   Con- 
temporary Review,  December,  1879,  p.  550. 


1877.]  LETTERS   OX   EDUCATION".  143 

one — Don't  tliink  that  nature  ( liunian  or  otlier)   is   corrupt ; 
don't  think  that  yuu  yourself  are  elect  out  uf  it ;  and  don't 
think  to  serve  Grod  by  praying  instead  of  obeying. 
Ever,  my  dear  Sir,  very  faithfully  yours, 

Jonx  RrsKiN. 


[From  "New  Year's  Address,"  etc.  (as  above),  1878.] 
A  PAGAN  MESSAGE. 

Hekne  Hill,  London,  S.E. 
19  Dec.  1877. 

My  dear  Sir  :  I  am  sure  you  know  as  well  as  I  that  the 
best  message  for  any  of  your  young  men  who  really  are  trying 
to  read  their  Bibles  is  whatever  they  lirst  chance  to  read  on 
whatever  morning. 

But  here's  a  Pagan  message  for  them,  which  will  be  a 
grandly  harmonized  bass  for  whatever  words  they  get  on  the 

New  Year. 

Inter  spem  curamque,  timores  et  inter  iras, 
Omnem  crede  diem  tibi  diluxisse  supremum.* 

("Amid  hope  and  sorrow,  amid  fear  and  wrath,  believe  every  day  that  has 
dawned  on  thee  to  be  thy  last.") 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

John  Ruszin. 


[From  "  The  Science  of  Life."] 
THE  FOUNDxiTlOXS  OF  CniVALRY.\ 

Venice,  February  8th,  1877. 

My  DEAR :  This  is  a  nobly  done   piece  of   work  of 

yours — a  fireman's  duty  in  fire  of  hell;  and  I  would  fain  help 

*  Horace,  Epistles,  i.  4.  12. 

•f-  The  following  letters  were  addressed  by  Mr.  Ruskin  to  the  author 
of  a  pamphlet  on  continence,  entitled  "  The  Science  of  Life,"  There  were 
two  editions  of  the  pamphlet,  and  of  these  only  the  second  contained  the 
first  and  last  of  these  letters,  whilst  only  the  first  contained  the  last  letter 
but  one.  Some  pussaires  also  in  the  other  letters  are  omitted  in  the  first 
edition,  and  a  few  slight  alterations  are  made  in  the  second  in  the  letter  of 
February  10. 


144  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1877. 

yon  in  all  I  conld,  bnt  mj  way  of  going  at  the  thing  would  be 
from  the  top  down — putting  the  fire  out  with  the  sun,  not 
with  vain  sprinklings.  People  would  say  I  wasn't  practical, 
as  usual  of  course ;  but  it  seems  to  me  the  last  thing  one 
should  do  in  the  business  is  to  play  Lord  Angelo,  and  set 
bar  and  door  to  deluge.  Not  but  I  should  sift  the  windows 
of  our  Oxford  printsellers,  if  I  had  my  full  way  in  my 
Art  Professorship ;  but  I  can't  say  the  tenth  part  of  what  I 
would.  Fm  in  the  very  gist  and  main  effort  of  quite  other 
work,  and  can't  get  my  mind  turned  to  this  rightly,  for  this, 
in  the  heart  of  it,  involves — well,  to  say  the  whole  range  of 
moral  philosophy,  is  nothing ;  this,  in  the  heart  of  it,  one 
can't  touch  unless  one  knew  the  moral  philosophy  of  angels 
also,  and  what  that  means,  "  but  are  as  the  angels  in  heaven." 
For  indeed  there  is  no  true  conqueror  of  Lust  but  Love  ;  and 
in  this  beautifully  scientific  day  of  the  British  nation,  in 
which  you  have  no  God  to  love  any  more,  but  only  an  omni- 
potent coagulation  of  copulation :  in  which  you  have  no  Law 
nor  King  to  love  any  more,  but  only  a  competition  and  a 
constitution,  and  the  oil  of  anointing  for  king  and  priest  used 
to  grease  your  iron  wheels  down  hill :  when  you  have  no 
country  to  love  any  more,  but  "  ]")atriotism  is  nationally 
what  selfishness  is  individually,"  ^  such  the  eternally-damned 
modern  view  of  the  matter — the  moral  syphilis  of  the  entire 
national  blood :  and,  finally,  when  you  have  no  true  bride  and 
groom  to  love  each  other  any  more,  but  a  girl  looking  out  for 
a  carriage  and  a  man  for  a  position,  what  have  you  left  on 
earth  to  take  pleasure  in,  except  theft  and  adultery  ? 

The  two  great  vices  play  into  each  other's  hands.  Ill- 
got  money  is  always  finally  spent  on  the  harlot.  Look  at 
Hogarth's  two  'prentices ;  the  sum  of  social  wisdom  is  in  that 
bit  of  rude  art-work,  if  one  reads  it  solemnly. 

*  For  further  notice  by  Mr.  Ruskin  of  this  maxim,  which  occurs  in 
Mr.  llc'ibert  Spencer's  "Study  of  Sociology,"  p.  205,  sec  the  article  on 
"Il'^me  and  its  Economies"  in  the  Contemjyorari/  Review  of  May,  1873,  and 
"Bibliotheca  Pastorum,"  p.  xxxiv. 


1877.]  LETTERS   ON   EDUCATION.  145 

Venice,  February  lOih. 

Hence,  if  from  any  place  in  earth,  I  ought  to  be  able  to 
send  you  some  words  of  warning  to  English  youths,  for  the 
ruin  of  this  mighty  city  was  all  in  one  word — fornication. 
Fools  who  think  they  can  write  liistory  will  tell  you  it  was 
''the  discovery  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,"  and  the  like! 
Alas  it  was  indeed  the  covering  of  every  hope  she  had,  in  God 
and  his  Law. 

For  indeed,  my  dear  friend,  I  doubt  if  you  can  fight  this 
evil  by  mere  heroism  and  common-sense.  Not  many  men  are 
lieroes;  not  many  are  rich  in  common-sense.  They  will  train 
for  a  boat-race;  will  they  for  the  race  of  life?  For  the 
applause  of  the  pretty  girls  in  blue  on  the  banks;  yes.  But 
to  win  the  soul  and  body  of  a  noble  woman  for  their  own  for- 
ever, will  they  ?  Kot  as  things  are  going,  I  think,  though 
how   or  where  they  are   to  go   or   end  is   to  me  at  present 

inconceivable. 

/' 

You  think,  perhaps,  I  could  help  you  therefore  with  a 
lecture  on  good  taste  and  Titian  ?  Ko,  not  at  all ;  I  might 
with  one  on  politics,  but  that  everybody  would  say  was  none 
of  my  business.  Yet  to  understand  the  real  meaning  of  the 
word  "  Sire,"  with  respect  to  the  rider  as  well  as  the  horse,  is 
indeed  the  basis  of  all  knowledge,  in  policy,  chivalry,  and 
social  order. 

All  that  you  have  advised  and  exposed  is  wisely  said  and 
bravely  told ;  but  no  advice,  no  exposure,  will  be  of  use,  until 
the  riojht  relation  exists  aojain  between  the  father  and  the 
mother  and  their  son.  To  deserve  his  confidence,  to  keep  it 
as  the  chief  treasure  committed  in  trust  to  them  by  God:  to 
be  the  father  his  strength,  the  mother  his  sanctiiication,  and 
both  his  chosen  refuge,  through  all  weakness,  evil,  danger,  and 
amazement  of  his  young  life.  My  friend,  while  you  still  teach 
in  Oxford  the  "philosophy,"  forsooth,  of  that  poor  cretinous 
wretch,  Stuart  Mill,  and  are  endeavoring  to  open  other 
""careers"  to  English  women  than  that  of  the  AVife  and  the 


146  MISCELLANEOUS    LETTERS.  '  [1877. 

Mother,  you  won't  make  your  men  chaste  by  recommending 
them  to  leave  off  tea.* 

Venice,  lltJi  February. 

My  dear :  I  would  say  much  more,  if  I  thought  any 

one  would  believe  me,  of  the  especial  calamity  of  this  time, 
with  respect  to  the  discipline  of  youth — in  having  no  food  any 
more  to  offer  to  their  imagination.  Military  distinction  is  no 
more  possible  by  prowess,  and  the  young  soldier  thinks  of  the 
hurdle-race  as  one  of  the  lists  and  the  field — but  the  noble 
temper  will  not  train  for  that  trial  with  equal  joy.  Clerical 
eminence — the  bishopric  or  popular  pastorship — may  be  tempt- 
ing to  men  of  genial  pride  or  sensitive  conceit :  but  the  fierce 
blood  that  would  have  burned  into  a  patriarch,  or  lashed  itself 
into  a  saint — what  "  career"  has  your  modern  philosophy  to 
offer  to  it  f 

The  entire  cessation  of  all  employment  for  the  faculty, 
which,  in  the  best  men  of  former  ages,  w^as  continually  exer- 
cised and  satisfied  in  the  realization  of  the  presence  of  Christ 
with  the  hosts  of  Heaven,  leaves  the  part  of  the  brain  which 
it  employed  absolutely  vacant,  and  ready  to  suck  in,  with  the 
avidity  of  vacuum,  whatever  pleasantness  may  be  presented  to 
the  natural  sight  in  the  gas-lighted  beauty  of  pantomimic  and 
casino  Paradise. 

All  these  disadvantages,  you  will  say,  are  inevitable,  and 
need  not  be  dwelt  upon.  In  my  own  school  of  St.  George  I 
mean  to  avoid  them  by  simply  making  the  study  of  Christianity 
a  true  piece  of  intellectual  work ;  my  boys  shall  at  least  know 
what  their  fathers  believed,  before  they  make  up  their  own 
wise  minds  to  disbelieve  it.  They  shall  be  infidels,  if  they 
choose,  at  thirty ;  but  only  students,  and  very  modest  ones,  at 

*  I  have  to  state  that  this  expression  regarding  Stuart  Mill  was  not 
intended  for  separate  publication;  and  to  explain  that  in  a  subsequent  but 
unpublished  letter  Mr.  Ruskin  explained  it  to  refer  to  Mill's  utter  deliciency 
in  the  powers  of  the  imagination. — The  last  words  of  this  letter  will  be 
made  clearer  by  noting  that  the  pamphlet  dealt  with  physical,  as  well  as 
mental,  diet. 


1877.]  LETTERS   ON   EDUCATION.  147 

fifteen.  But  I  shall  at  least  ask  of  modern  science  so  miicli 
help  as  shall  enable  nie  to  beij^in  to  teach  them  at  that  age  the 
physical  laws  relating  to  their  own  bodies,  oj-)enly,  thoroughly, 
and  with  awe;  and  of  modern  civilization,  I  shall  ask  so  much 
help  as  may  enable  me  to  teach  them  what  is  indeed  right,  and 
what  wrong,  f(jr  the  citizen  of  a  state  of  nol)le  humanity  to  do, 
and  permit  to  be  done,  by  others,  unaccused. 

And  if  you  can  found  two  such  chairs  in  Oxford — one,  of 
the  Science  of  Physical  Health  ;  the  other,  of  the  Law  of 
Human  Honor — you  need  not  trim  your  Horace,  nor  forbid 
us  our  chatty  afternoon  tea. 

I  could  say  ever  so  much  more,  of  course,  if  there  were 
only  time,  or  if  it  would  be  of  any  use — about  the  misappli- 
ance  of  the  imagination.  But  really,  the  essential  thing  is  the 
founding  of  real  schools  of  instruction  for  both  boys  and  girls 
— first,  in  domestic  medicine  and  all  that  it  means ;  and 
secondly,  in  the  plain  moral  law  of  all  humanity  :  "Thou  shalt 
not  commit  adultery,"  with  all  that  it  means. 

Ever  most  truly  yours, 

J.  KUSKIN. 

Venice,  l^th  February,  '11. 

My  dear :  Two  words  more,  and  an  end.     I  have  just 

re-read  the  paper  throughout.  There  are  two  omissions  which 
seem  to  me  to  need  serious  notice. 

The  first,  that  the  entire  code  of  counsel  which  you  have 
drawn  up,  as  that  which  a  father  should  give  his  son,  nuist  be 
founded  on  the  assumption  that,  at  the  proper  time  of  life,  the 
youth  will  1)0  able,  no  less  than  eager,  to  marry.  You  ought 
certainly  to  point  out,  incidentally,  what  in  my  St.  George's 
work  I  am  teaching  ]n-iinarily,  that  unless  this  first  economical 
condition  of  human  society  be  secured,  all  props  and  plasters 
of  its  morality  will  be  in  vain. 

And  in  the  second  place,  you  have  spoken  too  exclusively 
of  Lust,  as  if  it  were  the  normal  condition  of  sexual  feeling, 
and  the  only  one  properly  to  be  called  sexual.  But  the  great 
relation  of  the  sexes  is  Love,  not  Lusi: ;  that  is  the  relation  in 


148  MISCELLAN"EOUS   LETTERS.  [1878. 

which  "male  and  female  created  He  them;"  putting  into 
them,  indeed,  to  be  distinctly  restrained  to  the  ofiSce  of  fruit- 
fulness,  the  brutal  passion  of  Lust :  but  giving  them  the 
spiritual  power  of  Love,  that  each  spirit  might  be  greater  and 
purer  by  its  bond  to  another  associate  spirit,  in  this  world,  and 
that  which  is  to  come ;  help-mates,  and  sharers  of  each  other's 
joy  forever. 

Ever  most  ti-uly  yours, 

J.    KUSKIN. 

Malham,  July  Zd,  1878. 

Dear :  I  wish  I  were  able  to  add  a  few  more  words, 

with  energy  and  clearness,  to  my  former  letters,  respecting  a 
subject  of  which  my  best  strength — tliough  in  great  part  lately 
giv^en  to  it,  has  not  yet  enforced  the  moment — the  function, 
namely,  of  the  arts  of  music  and  dancing  as  leaders  and  gov- 
ernors of  the  bodily,  and  instinctive  mental,  passions.  Xo 
nation  will  ever  bring  up  its  youth  to  be  at  once  refined  and 
pure,  till  its  masters  have  learned  the  use  of  all  the  arts,  and 
primarily  of  these ;  till  they  again  recognize  the  gulf  that 
separates  the  Doric  and  Lydian  modes,  and  perceive  the  great 
ordinance  of  ]^s'ature,  that  the  pleasures  which,  rightly  ordered, 
exalt,  discipline,  and  guide  the  hearts  of  men,  if  abandoned  to 
a  reckless  and  popular  Dis-order,  as  surely  degrade,  scatter,  and 
deceive  alike  the  passions  and  intellect. 

I  observe  in  the  journals  of  yesterday,  announcement  that 
the  masters  of  many  of  our  chief  schools  are  at  last  desirous  of 
making  the  elements  of  Greek  art  one  of  the  branches  of  their 
code  of  instruction :  but  that  they  imagine  such  elements  may 
be  learned  from  plaster  casts  of  elegant  limbs  and  delicate 
noses. 

They  will  find  that  Greek  art  can  only  be  learned  from 
Greek  law,  and  from  the  religion  which  gives  law  of  life  to  all 
the  nations  of  the  earth.  Let  our  youth  once  more  learn  the 
meaning  of  the  words  "music,"  "chorus,"  and  "hymn"  prac- 
tically ;  and  with  the  understanding  that  all  such  practice,  from 
lowest  to  highest,  is,  if  rightly  done,  always  in  the  presence 


1878.]  LETTERS   OX    EDUCATION.  149 

and  to  the  praise  of  God  ;  and  we  shall  have  gone  far  to  shield 
them  in  a  noble  peace  and  glorions  safety  from  the  darkest 
questions  and  the  foulest  sins  that  have  perplexed  and  con- 
sumed the  you  til  of  past  generations  for  the  last  four  liundred 
years. 

Have  you  ever  lieard  the  charity  children  sing  in  St.  Paul's? 
Suppose  we  sometimes  allowed  God  the  honor  of  seeing  our 
nohle  children  collected  in  like  manner  to  sine:  to  Ilim,  what 
think  you  might  be  the  effect  of  such  a  festival — even  if  only 
held  once  a  year — on  the  national  manners  and  hearts? 
Ever  faithfully  and  affectionately  yours, 

J.    EuSKIN. 


MISCELLANEOUS  LETTERS. 


V. 
WOMEN:  THEIR  WORK  AND  THEIR  DRESS. 

Wo>rA^''s  Work.     1873. 
Female  Franchise.     1870. 
Proverbs  on  Right  Dress 
Sad-Colored  Costumes.     1870. 
Oak  Silkworms.     1862. 


WOMEN:    THEIK  WORK  AND  TIIEIB  DRESS. 


[From  "  L'Esp6rance,  Joumel  Mensuel,  orgrane  de  I'Association  des  Femmes.'/  Geneve, 

le  8  Mai,  1873.1 

WOMAN'S  WOBK 

Lettre  d  la  Presidente* 

Ma  chere  Madame  :  Je  vous  remercie  de  votre  lettre  si 
interessante,  car  je  sympathise  de  tout  mon  coeur  avec  la 
plupart  des  sentiments  et  des  souhaits  que  vous  y  exprimez. 
Mais  arriver  a  rendre  des  femmes  plus  nobles  et  plus  sages  est 
une  chose;  les  elever  de  fagon  a  ce  qu'elles  entretiennent 
leurs  maris  est  une  autre ! 

Je  ne  puis  trouver  des  termes  assez  forts  pour  exprimer  la 
haine  et  le  mepris  que  je  ressens  pour  I'idee  moderne  qu'une 
femme  doit  cesser  d'etre  mere,  fiile,  ou  femme  pour  qu'elle 
puisse  devenir  commis  ou  ingenieur. 

Yous  etes  toutes  entierement  sottes  dans  cette  matiere. 
Le  devoir  d'un  homme  est  d'entretenir  sa  femme  et  ses 
enfants,  celui  d'une  femme  est  de  le  rendre  heureux  chez 
lui,  et  d'elever  ses  enfants  sagement.  Aucune  femme  n'est 
capable  de  faire  plus  que  cela.  Aucune  femme  ne  doit  faire 
moins,  et  un  homme  qui  ne  peut  pas  nourrir  sa  femme,  et 
desire  qu'elle  travaille  pour  lui,  merite  d'etre  pendu  au-dessus 
de  sa  porte. 

Je  suis,  Madame,  fidelement  a  vous, 

J.  RUSKIN. 

*I  have  been  unable  to  get  access  to  the  paper  from  which  tliis  letter 
is  taken,  and  must  therefore  leave  without  explanation  the  fortunately  un- 
important references  in  its  first  paragraph. 


154  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1862. 

[Date  and  place  of  publication  unknown.] 

FEMALE  FBANGHISE. 

Venice,  29<^  May,  1870. 
Sir:  I  am  obliged  by  your  note.  I  have  no  time  for 
private  correspondence  at  present,  but  you  are  quite  right  in 
your  supposition  as  to  my  views  respecting  female  franchise. 
So  far  from  wishing  to  give  votes  to  women,  I  would  fain 
take  them  away  from  most  men."^ 

Very  sincerely  yours, 

J.  EUSKEN. 


[From  "  The  Monthly  Packet,"  November,  1863,  p.  556.] 

PROVERBS   ON  RIGHT  DRESS.  \ 

Geneva,  October  20th,  1862. 
My  dear  Sir  :  I  am  much  obliged  by  your  letter :  pardon 
me  if  for  brevity's  sake  I  answer  with  appearance  of  dogma- 
tism. You  will  see  the  subject  treated  as  fully  as  I  am  able 
in  the  course  of  the  papers  on  political  economy,  of  which  the 
tw^o  first  have  already  appeared  in  Fraser's  Magazine.ij: 
/     The  man  and  woman  are  meant  by  God  to  be  perfectly 

*So  also  in  writing  an  excuse  for  absence  from  a  lecture  upon 
"Woman's  Work  and  Woman's  Sphere,"  given  on  behalf  of  the  French 
female  refugees  by  Miss  Emily  Faithfull  in  February,  1871,  Mr.  Ruskin  said: 
"  I  most  heartily  sympathize  with  you  in  your  purpose  of  defining  woman's 
work  and  sphere.  It  is  as  refreshing  as  the  dew's,  and  as  defined  as  the 
moon's,  but  it  is  not  the  rain's  nor  the  sun's."  {Daily  Telegraph,  Feb.  21, 
1871.) 

f  The  preceding  numbers  of  the  Monthly  Packet  had  contained  various 
letters  upon  dress,  and  the  present  one  was  thf^n  s^-^  o  the  Editor  by  the 
person  to  whom  it  was  originally  addressed. 

X  In  June  and  September,  1863.    See  tl^  j  chapters  of  "  Munera 

Pulveris."  jy  • 


]  LETTERS    ON    WOMAN'S    WORK    AND    DRESS.  155 

noble  and  beautiful  in  each  other's  eyes.  The  dress  is  right 
which  makes  them  so.  The  best  dress  is  that  which  is  beauti- 
ful in  the  eyes  of  noble  and  wise  persons. 

Riirht  dress  is  therefore  that  which  is  tit  for  the  station  in 
life,  and  the  work  to  be  done  in  it ;  and  which  is  otherwise 
graceful — becoming — lasting — healthful — and  easy ;  on  occa- 
sion, splendid  ;  always  as  beautiful  as  possible. 

Eight  dress  is  therefore  strong — simple — radiantly  clean — 
carefully  put  on — carefully  kept. 

Cheap  dress,  bought  for  cheapness  sake,  and  costly  dress 
bought  for  costliness  sake,  are  hoth  abominations.  Eight  dress 
is  bought  for  its  worth,  and  at  its  worth ;  and  bought  only 
when  wanted. 

Beautiful  dress  is  chiefly  beautiful  in  color — in  harmony 
of  parts — and  in  mode  of  putting  on  and  wearing.  Eightness 
of  mind  is  in  nothing  more  shown  than  in  the  mode  of  wear- 
ing simple  dress. 

Ornamentation  involving  design,  such  as  embroidery,  etc., 
produced  solely  by  industry  of  hand^  is  highly  desirable  in  the 
state  dresses  of  all  classes,  down  to  the  lowest  peasantry. 

National  costume,  wisely  adopted  and  consistently  worn,  is 
not  only  desirable  but  necessary  in  riMit  national  oro:anization. 
Obeying  fashion  is  a  great  folly,  and  a  greater  crime ;  but 
gradual  changes  in  dress  properly  accompany  a  healthful 
national  development. 

The  Scriptural  authority  for  dress  is  centralized  by  Proverbs 
xxxi.  21,  22 ;  and  by  1  Samuel  i.  24 ;  the  latter  especially 
indicating  the  duty  of  the  king  or  governor  of  the  state ;  as 
the  former  the  duty  of  the  housewife.  It  is  necessary  for  the 
complete  understanding  of  those  passages,  that  the  reader 
should  know  that  "  scarlet"  means  intense  central  radiance  of 
pure  color ;  it  is  the  type  of  purest  color — between  pale  and 
dark — between  sad  and  gay.  It  was  therefore  used  with 
hyssop  as  a  type  of  purification.  There  are  many  stronger 
passages,  such  a^^^^^'n  xlv.  13,  14;  but  as  some  people  read 
them  under  the  ii;  ....  ;]^  of  their  being  figurative,  I  need 
not   refer   to   them.  •-,   passages   in   the   Prophecies   and 


156  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1870. 

Epistles  against  dress  apply  only  to  its  abuses.  Dress  worn 
for  the  sake  of  vanity,  or  coveted  in  jealousy,  is  as  evil  as  any- 
thing else  similarly  so  abused.  A  woman  should  earnestly 
desire  to  be  beautiful,  as  she  should  desire  to  be  intelligent ; 
her  dress  should  be  as  studied  as  her  words ;  but  if  the  one 
is  worn  or  the  other  spoken  in  vanity  or  insolence,  both  are 
equally  criminal. 

I  have  not  time,  and  there  is  no  need,  to  refer  you  to  the 
scattered  notices  of  dress  in  my  books:  the  most  important  is 
rather  near  the  beginning  of  my  Political  Economy  of  Art ;  * 
but  I  have  not  the  book  by  me :  if  you  make  any  use  of  this 
letter  (you  may  make  any  you  please),  I  should  like  you  to 
add  that  passage  to  it,  as  it  refers  to  the  more  inmiediate  need 
of  economy  in  dress,  when  the  modes  of  its  manufacture  are 
irregular,  and  cause  distress  to  the  operative. 

Believe  me,  my  dear  Sir,  very  faithfully  yours, 

J.    KUSKIN. 


[From  "  Macmillan's  Magazine,"  November,  1870,  p.  80.] 
SAD-COLORED   COSTUMES. 

Denmark  Hill,  S.E.,  \Uh  Oct.,  1870. 
To  the  Editor  of  "Macmillan's  Magazine."  •  ^^^H 

Sir  :  At  p.  423  of  your  current  number,  Mr.  Stopford  ^^ 
Brooke  states  that  it  is  a  proposal  of  mine  for  regenerating  the 
country,  that  the  poor   should    be  "dressed  all   in  one  sad- 
colored  costume."  f 

It  is,  indeed,  too  probable  that  one  sad-colored  costume 

*See  pp.  67-75  of  the  original,  and  50-55  of  the  new  edition  ("A  Joy 
for  Ever"). 

f  Mr.  Stopford  Brooke's  article  was  a  review  of  Mr,  Ruskin's  "Lectures 
on  Art "  delivered  at  Oxford,  and  then  recently  published.  In  a  note  to 
the  present  letter  the  Editor  of  the  Magazine  stated  Mr.  Brooke's  regret 
"at  having  been  led  by  a  slip  of  memory  into  making  an  inaccurate  state- 
ment."^ 


1870.]  LETTERS   ON    WOMAX'S   WORK    AND    DRESS.  157 

may  soon  be  "your  only  wear,"  instead  of  the  present  motley — 
for  both  poor  and  rich.  But  the  attainment  of  tliis  monotony 
was  never  a  proposition  of  mine;  and  as  I  am  well  aware  Mr. 
Brooke  would  not  have  been  guilty  of  misrepresentation,  if  he 
Lad  had  time  to  read  the  books  he  was  speaking  of,  I  am  sure 
he  will  concur  in  my  request  that  you  would  print  in  full  the 
passages  to  which  he  imagined  himself  to  be  referring. 
I  am,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

John  Ruskin. 

1.  ^^  You  ladies  like  to  lead  the  fashion:  by  all  means  lead  it. 
Lead  it  thoroughly.  Lead  it  far  enough.  Dress  yourselves 
nicely,  and  dress  everybody  else  nicely.  Lead  the  fashions  for 
the  poor  first;  make  them  look  well,  and  you  yourselves  will  look 
— in  ways  of  which  you  have  at  present  no  conception — all  the 
hQtiev:'— Crown  of  Wild  Olive  (186G),  p.  18.* 

2.  "  In  the  simplest  and  clearest  definition  of  it,  economy, 
whether  public  or  private,  means  the  wise  management  of  labor; 
and  it  means  this  mainly  in  three  senses:  namely,  first,  applying 
your  labor  rationally;  secondly,  preserving  its  produce  carefully; 
lastly,  distributing  its  produce  seasonably. 

**I  say  first,  applying  your  labor  rationally;  that  is,  so  as  to 
obtain  the  most  precious  things  you  can,  and  the  most  lasting 
things  by  it:  not- growing  oats  in  land  where  you  can  grow 
wheat,  nor  putting  fine  embroidery  on  a  stuff  that  will  not  wear. 
Secondly,  preserving  its  produce  carefully;  that  is  to  say,  laying 
up  your  wheat  wisely  in  storehouses  for  the  time  of  famine,  and 
keeping  your  embroidery  watchfully  from  the  moth;  and  lastl}^ 
distributing  its  produce  seasonably;  that  is  to  say,  being  able 
to  carry  your  corn  at  once  to  the  place  where  the  people  are 
hungry,  and  your  embroideries  to  the  places  where  they  are  gay; 
so  fulfilling  in  all  ways  the  wise  man's  description,  whether  of 
the  qiTeenly  housewife  or  queenly  nation:  '  She  riseth  while  it  is 
yet  night,  and  giveth  meat  to  her  household,  and  a  portion 
to  her  maidens.  She  maketh  herself  coverings  of  tapestry,  her 
clothing  is  silk  and  purple.  Strength  and  honor  are  in  her 
clothing,  and  she  shall  rejoice  in  time  to  come.' 

*  See  the  1873  edition  of  the  "  Crown  of  Wild  Olive,"  p.  30,  §  27. 


158  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1862. 

'^  Now  yon  will  observe  that  in  this  description  of  the  perfect 
economist,  or  mistress  of  a  household,  there  is  a  studied  expres- 
sion of  the  balanced  division  of  her  care  between  the  two  great 
objects  of  utility  and  splendor:  in  her  right  hand,  food  and  flax, 
for  life  and  clothing;  in  her  left  hand,  the  purple  and  the 
needlework,  for  honor  and  for  beauty.  .  .  .  And  in  private  and 
household  economy  you  may  always  judge  of  its  perfectness  by 
its  fair  balance  between  the  use  and  the  pleasure  of  its  posses- 
sions: you  will  see  the  wise  cottager's  garden  trimly  divided 
between  its  well-set  vegetables  and  its  fragrant  flowers:  you  will 
see  the  good  housewife  taking  pride  in  her  pretty  tablecloth  and 
her  glittering  shelves,  no  less  than  in  her  well-dressed  dish  and 
full  store-room:  the  care  will  alternate  with  gayety;  and  though 
you  will  reverence  her  in  her  seriousness,  you  will  know  her  best 
by  her  smile."— ''Political  Economy  of  Ai't"(1857),  pp.  10-13.* 


]From  "  The  Times,"  October  24, 1862.] 
OAK  SILKWORMS. 


To  the  Editor  of ' '  The  Times. " 

Sir  :  In  your  excellent  article  of  October  17,  on  possible 
substitutes  for  cotton,  you  say  "  it  is  very  doubtful  whether 
we  could  introduce  the  silkworm  with  profit."  The  silkworm 
of  the  mulberry  tree,  indeed,  requires  a  warmer  climate  than 
ours,  but  has  attention  yet  been  directed  to  the  silkworm  of 
the  oak  ?  A  day  or  two  ago  a  physician  of  European  reputa- 
tion, Dr.  L.  A.  Gosse,  w-as  speaking  to  me  of  the  experiments 
recently  made  in  France  in  its  acclimatization.  He  stated  to 
me  that  the  only  real  diflSculty  was  temporary — namely,  in 
the  importation  of  the  eggs,  which  are  prematurely  hatched  as 
they  are  brought  through  warm  latitudes.  A  few  only  have 
reached  Europe,  and  their  multiplication  is  slow,  but  once  let 
them  be  obtained  in  quantity  and  the  stripping  of  an  oak 

*  See  "A  Joy  for  Ever"  (1880),  pp.  7-9. 


1862.]  LETTERS   ON    WOMAN'S    WOKK    AND    DRESS.  lo9 

coppice  is  both  robe  and  revenue.  The  silk  is  stronger  than 
that  of  the  mulberry  tree,  and  the  stuff  woven* of  it  more 
healthy  than  cotton  stuffs  for  the  wearer ;  it  also  wears  twice 
as  long.  This  is  Dr.  Gosse's  report — likely  to  be  a  trust- 
worthy one — at  all  events,  it  seems  to  me  worth  sending  you. 
I  remain  your  obedient  servant, 

J.  RuriKIN. 
Geneva,  Oct.  20^^. 


MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS. 


VI. 

LITERARY    CRITICISM. 

The  Publication  of  Books.     1875. 

A  Mistaken  Review.     1875. 

The  Position  op  Critics.     1875. 

Coventry  Patmore's  "Faithful  for  Ever."    1860. 

"The  Queen  of  the  Air."    1871. 

The  Animals  of  Scripture:  A  Review.     1856. 

"Limner"  AND  "Illumination."    1854. 

Notes  on  a  Word  in  Shakespeare.     1878.    (Two  Letters.) 

The  Merchant  of  Venice.     1880. 

Recitations.     1880. 


YI. 
LITERARY   CRITICISM. 


[From  "The  World,"  June  9,  1875.] 

THE  PUBLICATION^  OF  BOOKS* 

Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford, 
June  6,  1875. 
To  the  Editor  of  "  The  World." 

Sir  :  I  am  very  grateful  for  the  attention  and  candor  witli 
which  you  have  noticed  my  effort  to  introduce  a  new  metliod 
of  pubHshing. 

Will  you  allow  me  to  explain  one  or  two  points  in  which 
I  am  generally  ndsunderstood  ?  I  meant  to  have  asked  your 
leave  to  do  so  at  some  length,  but  have  been  entirely  busy, 

*This  letter  refers  to  an  article  on  Mr.  Ruskin's  peculiar  method  of  pub- 
lication which  appeared  in  the  World  of  May  26,  1875.  It  was  entitled 
"Ruskin  to  the  Rescue,"  and  with  the  criticism  to  which  !Mr.  Ruskin 
alludes,  strongly  approved  the  idea  of  some  reform  being  attempted  in  the 
matter  of  the  publication  of  books.  Mr.  Ruskin  began  the  still  continued 
method  of  publishing  his  works  in  1871;  and  the  following  advertisement, 
inserted  in  the  earlier  copies  of  the  first  book  thus  published— "  Sesame 
and  Lilies" — will  give  the  reader  further  information  on  the  matter. 

"It  has  long  been  in  my  mind  to  make  some  small  beginning  of 
resistance  to  the  existing  system  of  irregular  discount  in  the  bookselling 
trade— not  in  hostility  to  booksellers,  but,  as  I  think  they  will  find  eventu- 
ally, with  a  just  regard  to  their  interest,  as  well  as  to  that  of  authors.  Every 
volume  of  this  series  of  my  collected  works  will  be  sold  to  the  trade  without 
any  discount  or  allowance  on  quantity,  at  such  a  fixed  price  as  will  allow 
both  author  and  publisher  a  moderate  profit  on  each  volume.  It  will  be  sold 
to  the  trade  only;  who  can  then  fix  such  further  profit  on  it  as  they  deem 
fitting,  for  retail. 

"  Every  volume  will  be  clearly  printed,  and  thoroughly  well  bound:  on 


164  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTEllS.  [1875. 

and  can  only  say,  respecting  two  of  your  questions,  what  in 
my  own  mind  are  tlie  answers. 

I.  "  How  many  authors  are  strong  enough  to  do  without 
advertisements  ?" 

None:  while  advertisement  is  the  practice.  But  let  it 
become  the  fashion  to  announce  books  once  for  all  in  a 
monthly  circular  (pubhslier's,  for  instance),  and  the  public 
will  simply  refer  to  that  for  all  they  want  to  know.  Such 
advertisement  I  use  now,  and  always  would. 

II.  "  Why  has  he  determined  to  be  his  own  publisher?" 

1  wish  entirely  to  resist  the  practice  of  writing  for  money 
early  in  life.  I  think  an  author's  business  requires  as  much 
training  as  a  musician's,  and  that,  as  soon  as  he  can  write  really 
well,  there  would  always,  for  a  man  of  worth  and  sense,  be 
found  capital  enough  to  enable  him  to  be  able  to  print,  say,  a 
hundi-ed  pages  of  his  cai-ef ul  work ;  which,  if  the  public  were 
pleased  with,  they  would  soon  enable  him  to  print  more. '  I 
do  not  think  young  men  should  rush  into  print,  nor  old  ones 
modify  their  books  to  please  publishers. 

III.  And  it  seems  to  me,  considering  that  the  existing 
excellent  books  in  the  world  would — if  they  were  heaped 
together  in  great  towns — overtop  their  cathedrals,  that  at  any 
age  a  man  should  think  long  before  he  invites  his  neighbors  to 
listen  to  his  sayings  on  any  subject  whatever. 

What  I  do,  therefore,  is  done  only  in  the  conviction,  fool- 
ish, egotistic,  whatever  you  like  to  call  it,  but  firm,  that  I  am 
writing  what  is  needful  and  useful  for  my  fellow-creatures  ; 
that  if  it  is  so,  they  will  in  due  time  discover  it,  and  that 
before  due  time  I  do  not  want  it  discovered.     And  it  seems  to 

such  conditions  the  price  to  the  public,  allowing  full  profit  to  the  retailer, 
may  sometimes  reach,  but  ought  never  to  exceed,  half  a  guinea,  nor  do  I 
wish  it  to  be  less.  I  will  fully  state  my  reasons  for  this  procedure  in  the 
June  number  of  Fors  CUivicjera. 

"  The  price  of  this  first  volume  to  the  trade  is  seven  shillings." 

In  subsequent   similar  notices,   some  parts  of  this  plan,  especially  as 

regarded  purchasers  and  price,  were  altered;  the  trade  not  accepting  the 

offer  of  sale  to  them  only,  and  the  "trouble  and  difficulty  of  revising  text 

and  preparing  phites"  proving  much  greater  than  I\Ir.  Ruskin  had  expected. 


1875.]  LETTERS   ON   CRITICISM.  1G5 

me  that  no  sound  scliolar  or  true  well-wislier  to  the  people 
about  him  would  write  in  any  other  temper.  I  mean  to  be 
])aid  for  my  work,  if  it  is  worth  payment.  Not  otherwise. 
And  it  seems  to  me  my  mode  of  publication  is  the  proper 
method  of  ascertaining  that  fact.  I  had  much  more  to  say, 
but  have  no  more  time,  and  am,  sir,  very  respectfully  yours, 

JOUN    RUSKIN. 


[From  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  January  11, 1875.] 

A  MISTAKEN  REVIEW* 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  The  excellent  letters  and  notes  which  nave  recently 
appeared  in  your  columns  on  the  subject  of  reviewing  lead  me 
to  think  that  you  will  give  me  space  for  the  statement  of  one 
or  two  things  which  I  believe  it  is  right  the  public  should 
know  respecting  the  review  which  appeared  in  the  Examiner 
of  the  2d  of  this  month  (but  which  I  did  not  see  till  yester- 
day), by  Mr.  W.  B.  Scott,  of  Mr.  St.  J.  Tyrrwhitt's  "Letters 
on  Landscape  Art." 

1.  Mr.  Scott  is  one  of  the  rather  numerous  class  of  artists 
of  whose  works  I  have  never  taken  any  public  notice,  and  who 
attribute  my  silence  to  my  inherent  stupidity  of  disposition. 

2.  Mr.  Scott  is  also  one  of  the  more  limited  and  peculiarly 
unfortunate  class  of  artists  who  suppose  themselves  to  have 
great  native  genius,  dislike  being  told  to  learn  perspective,  and 
prefer  the  first  volume  of  "  Modern  Painters,"  which  praises 

*  Of  this  review  nothing  need  be  said  beyond  what  is  stated  in  this 
letter.  The  full  title  of  the  book  which  it  so  harshly  treated  is  "Our 
Sketching  Club.  Letters  and  Studies  on  Land.scape  Art."  By  the  Rev.  R. 
St.  John  Tyrrwhitt,  M.A.  With  an  authorized  reproduction  of  the  le.'^.'^ons 
and  woodcuts  in  Professor  Ruskin's  "  Elements  of  Drawing."  Macmillan, 
1874,  The  "letters  and  notes"  refer  especially  to  one  signed  "K"  in  the 
Gazette  of  January  1,  and  another  signed  "A  Young  Author"  in  that  of 
January  4.  The  principal  complaint  of  both  these  letters  was  that  reviewers 
seldom  master,  and  sometimes  do  not  even  read  the  books  they  criticise. 


166  MISCELLAN-EOUS   LETTEES.  [1875. 

many  third-rate  painters,  and  teaches  none,  to  the  following 
volumes,  which  praise  none  but  good  painters,  and  sometimes 
admit  the  weakness  of  advising  bad  ones. 

3.  My  first  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Scott  was  at  the  house 
of  a  gentleman  whose  interior  walls  he  was  decorating  with 
historic  frescos,  and  whose  patronage  I  (rightly  or  wrongly) 
imagined  at  that  time  to  be  of  importance  to  him.  I  was  then 
more  good-natured  and  less  conscientious  than  I  am  now,  and 
my  host  and  hostess  attached  weight  to  my  opinions.  I  said 
all  the  good  I  truly  could  of  the  frescos,  and  no  harm  ; 
painted  a  corn-cockle  on  the  walls  myself,  in  reverent  sub- 
ordination to  them  ;  got  out  of  the  house  as  soon  afterwards  as 
I  could,  and  never  since  sought  Mr.  Scott's  acquaintance 
further  (though,  to  my  regret,  he  was  once  photographed  in 
the  same  plate  with  Mr.  Eosetti  and  me).  Mr.  Scott  is  an 
honest  man,  and  naturally  thinks  me  a  hypocrite  and  turncoat 
as  well  as  a  fool. 

4.  The  honestest  man  in  writing  a  review  is  apt  sometimes 
to  give  obscure  statements  of  facts  which  ought  to  have  been 
clearly  stated  to  make  the  review  entirely  fair.  Permit  me  to 
state  in  very  few  words  those  which  I  think  the  review  in 
question  does  not  clearly  represent.  My  "  Elements  of  Draw- 
ing" were  out  of  print,  and  sometimes  asked  for ;  I  wished  to 
rewrite  them,  but  had  not  time,  and  knew  that  my  friend  and 
pupil,  Mr.  Tyrrwhitt,  was  better  acquainted  than  I  myself 
with  some  processes  of  water-color  sketching,  and  was  perfectly 
acquainted  with  and  heartily  acceptant  of  the  principles  which 
I  have  taught  to  be  essential  in  all  art.  I  knew  he  could 
write,  and  I  therefore  asked  him  to  write,  a  book  of  his  own 
to  take  the  place  of  the  "Elements,"  and  authorized  him  to 
make  arrangements  with  my  former  publisher  for  my  wood- 
blocks, mostly  drawn  on  the  wood  by  myself. 

The  book  is  his  own,  not  mine,  else  it  would  have  been 
published  as  mine,  not  his.  I  have  not  read  it  all,  and  do  not 
answer  for  it  all.  But  when  I  wrote  the  "  Elements"  I  be- 
lieved conscientiously  that  book  of  mine  to  be  the  best  then 
attainable  by  the  public  on  the  subject  of  elementary  drawing. 


1875.]  LETTERS   OX   CRITICISM.  167 

I  think  Mr.  Tyrrwliitt's  a  better  book,  know  it  to  be  a  more 

interesting  one,  and  believe  it  to  be,  in  like  manner,  the  best 

now  attainable  by  the  British  pul)lic  on  elementary  practice  of 

art.  I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

John  Ruskin. 
Brantwood,  Jan.  10. 


[From  "The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  January  19,  1875.] 

THE  POSITION  OF  CRITICS. 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir  :  I  see  you  are  writing  of  criticism ;  "^  some  of  your 
readers  may,  perhaps,  be  interested  in  hearing  the  notions  of 
a  man  who  has  dabbled  in  it  a  good  many  years.  I  believe,  in 
a  word,  that  criticism  is  as  impertinent  in  the  world  as  it  is  in 
a  drawing-room.  In  a  kindly  and  well-bred  company,  if  any- 
body tries  to  please  them,  they  try  to  be  pleased;  if  anybody 
tries  to  astonish  them,  they  have  the  courtesy  to  be  astonished  ; 
if  people  become  tiresome,  they  ask  somebody  else  to  play,  or 
sing,  or  what  not,  but  they  don't  criticise.  For  the  rest,  a  bad 
critic  is  probably  the  most  mischievous  person  in  the  world 
(Swift's  Goddess  of  Criticism  in  the  *'  Tale  of  a  Tub  "  seems 
what  need  be  represented,  on  that  subject  f),  and  a  good  one 
the  most  helpless  and  unhappy :  the  more  he  knows,  the  less 
he  is  trusted,  and  it  is  too  likely  he  may  become  morose  in  his 
unacknowledged  power.  A  good  executant,  in  any  art,  gives 
pleasure  to  multitudes,  and  breathes  an  atmosphere  of  praise, 
but  a  strong  critic  is  every  man's  adversary — men  feel  that  he 
knows  their  foibles,  and  cannot  conceive  that  he  knows  more. 

*  Since  the  correspondence  already  mentioned,  the  Gazette  of  January  14 
and  18  had  contained  two  long  letters  on  the  subject  from  "  A  Reviewer." 

\  The  Goddess  of  Criticism,  with  Ignorance  and  Pride  for  her  parents, 
Opinion  for  her  sister,  and  for  her  children  Noise  and  Impudence,  Dulness 
and  Vanity,  Positiveness,  Pedantry,  and  Ill-manners,  is  described  in  the 
"  Battle  of  the  Books" — the  paper  which  follows,  and  is  a  companion  to  the 
"Tale  of  a  Tub." 


168  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [I860- 

His  praise,  to  be  acceptable,  must  be  always  unqualified  ;  his 
equity  is  an  oiTence  instead  of  a  virtue ;  and  the  art  of  correc- 
tion, which  he  has  learned  so  laboriously,  only  fills  his  hearers 
with  disgust. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

John  Eusxm. 
BraisTWOOD,  Jan.  18. 


[From  "  The  Critic,"  October  27,  I860.] 

COVENTRY  PxiTMORE'S  "FAITHFUL  FOR  EVER." 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Critic.'' 

Sir  :  I  do  not  doubt,  from  what  I  have  observed  of  the 
general  tone  of  the  criticisms  in  your  columns,  that,  in  candor 
and  courtesy,  you  will  allow  me  to  enter  protest,  bearing  such 
worth  as  private  opinion  may,  against  the  estimate  expressed 
in  your  last  number  of  the  merits  of  Mr.  C.  Patmore's  new 
poem.^  It  seems  to  me  that  you  have  read  it  hastily ;  and 
that  you  have  taken  such  view  of  it  as  on  a  first  reading 
almost  every  reader  of  good  but  impatient  judgment  would  be 
but  too  apt  to  concur  with  you  in  adopting — one,  nevertheless, 
which,  if  you  examine  the  poem  with  care,  you  will,  I  think, 
both  for  your  readers'  sake  and  Mr.  Patmore's,  regret  having 
expressed  so  decidedly. 

Tlie  poem  is,  to  the  best  of  my  perception  and  belief,  a 
singularly  perfect  piece  of  art ;  containing,  as  all  good  art 
does,  many  very  curious  shortcomings  (to  appearance),  and 
places  of  rest,  or  of  dead  color,  or  of  intended  harshness, 
which,  if  they  are  seen  or  quoted  without  the  parts  of  the 
piece  to  which  they  relate,  are  of  course  absurd  enough,  pre- 
cisely as  the  discords  in  a  fine  piece  of  music  would  be  if  you 
played  them  without  their  resolutions.  You  have  quoted 
separately  Mr.  Patmore's  discords;   you  might  by  the  same 

*  The  tone  of  the  criticism  is  sufRcientlj'-  explained  in  this  letter. 


I860.]  LETTERS   ON    CRITICISM.  169 

system  of  examination  have  made  Mozart  or  Mendelssohn 
a])pear  to  be  no  musicians,  as  you  liave  probably  convinced 
your  quick  readei-s  that  Mr.  Patmore  is  no  poet. 

I  will  not  beg  of  you  so  much  space  as  would  be  necessary 
to  analyze  the  poem,  but  I  hope  you  will  let  me — once  for  all 
— protest  against  the  method  of  criticism  which  assumes  that 
entire  familiarity  and  simplicity  in  certain  portions  of  a  great 
N\  ork  destroy  its  dignity.  Simple  things  ought  to  be  simply 
>aid,  and  truly  poetical  diction  is  nothing  more  nor  less  than 
light  diction;  the  incident  being  itself  poetical  or  not,  accord- 
ing to  its  relations  and  the  feelings  which  it  is  intended  to 
manifest — not  according  to  its  own  nature  merely.  To  take  a 
>ingle  instance  out  of  Homer  bearing  on  that  same  simple 
household  work  which  you  are  so  shocked  at  Mr.  Patmore's 
taking  notice  of,  Homer  describes  the  business  of  a  family 
washing,  when  it  comes  into  his  poem,  in  the  most  accurate 
terms  he  can  find.  "  They  took  the  clothes  in  their  hands  ; 
and  poured  on  the  clean  water;  and  trod  them  in  trenches 
thoroughly,  trying  who  could  do  it  best;  and  when  they  had 
^vashed  them  and  got  off  all  the  dirt,  they  spread  them  out 
nu  the  sea-beach,  where  the  sea  had  blanched  the  shingle 
cleanest."* 


*  See  Homer,  Odyssey,  vi.  90. 

Etuara  x^P^^^   eXovro   xal    Idcpopeov  /.leXav   vdoopy 
"SrETfSov   S^v   ft60po-i6i   Ooco<i   epiSa   irpocpEpovCai. 
Avrdp   tTtai    itXvvccv    re    HaOr/pdv    re   pvita   Ttdrra, 
'Eqeir/^   Tteradccv    napd   Olv    aAo?,  rjxi  judXidra 
Aaiyya^   norl   x^pf^ov    aTioTtXvyedHE   QdXadda. 

The  verse  translation  of  tliis  passage  given  in  the  letter  is  from  Pope's 
( )(lyssey. 

The  lines  in  "  Faithful  for  Ever,"  particularly  alluded  to  as  having  been 
(ondemned  by  the  "Critic,"  were  those  here  italicized  in  the  following 
passage: 

"  For  your  sake  I  am  ^lad  to  hear 

You  sail  so  soon.     I  send  7/ou,  Dear, 

A  triflinq  present;  and  irill  supply 

Tour  Salisbury  costs.     You  have  to  buy 

Almost  an  outfit  for  this  cruise! 

But  many  ore  good  enough  to  use 


170  MISCELLANEOUS  LETTERS.  [1860. 

These  are  the  terms  in  wliicli  the  great  poet  explains  the 
matter.  The  less  jDoet — or,  rather,  man  of  modern  wit  and 
breeding,  %oitliout  superior  poetical  power  —  thus  puts  the 
affair  into  dignilied  language  : 

Then  emulous  the  royal  robes  they  Lave, 
And  plunge  the  vestures  in  the  cleansing  wave. 
(The  vestures  cleansed  o'erspread  the  shelly  sand, 
Their  snowy  lustre  whitens  all  the  strand.) 

Kow,  to  my  mind,  Homer's  language  is  by  far  the  most  poeti- 
cal of  the  two — is,  in  fact,  the  only  poetical  language  possible 
in  the  matter.  Whether  it  was  desirable  to  give  any  account 
of  this,  or  anything  else,  depends  wholly  on  the  relation  of 
the  passage  to  the  rest  of  the  poem,  and  you  could  only  show 
Mr.  Patmore's  glance  into  tlie  servant's  room  to  be  ridiculous 
by  proving  the  mother's  mind,  which  it  illustrates,  to  be  ridicu- 
lous. Similarly,  if  you  were  to  take  one  of  Mr.  George  Eich- 
mond's  perfectest  modern  portraits,  and  give  a  little  separate 
engraving  of  a  bit  of  the  neck-tie  or  coat-lappet,  you  might 
easily  demonstrate  a  very  prosaic  character  either  in  the 
riband-end  or  the  button-hole.  But  the  only  real  question 
respecting  them  is  their  relation  to  the  face,  and  the  degree 
in  which  they  help  to  express  the  character  of  the  wearer. 
What  the  real  relations  of  the  parts  are  in  the  poem  in  ques- 
tion only  a  thoughtful  and  sensitive  reader  will  discover. 
The  poem  is  not  meant  for  a  song,  or  calculated  for  an  hour's 
amusement;  it  is,  as  I  said,  to  the  best  of  my  belief,  a  finished 
and  tender  work  of  very  noble  art.  Whatever  on  this  head 
may  be  the  final  judgment  of  the  public,  I  am  bound,  for  my 
own  part,  to  express  my  obligation  to  Mr.  Patmore,  as  one  of 
.my  severest  models  and  tutors  in  use  of  English,  and   my 

Again,  among  the  things  yon  send 
To  give  away.    My  maid  sh all  mend 
And  let  you  have  them  back.    Adieu  I 
Tell  me  of  all  j-ou  see  and  do. 
I  know,  thank  God,  whate'or  it  be, 
'Twill  need  no  veil  'twixt  you  and  me." 
("  Faithful  for  Ever,"  p.  1  r,  II.    "  Mrs.  Graham  to  Frederick,"  her  sailor  son.) 


ISri.]  LETTERS   ON   CRITICISM.  171 

respect  for  him  as  one  of  tlie  truest  and  tcnderest  thinkers 
who  have  ever  illustrated  tlie  most  important,  because  com- 
monest, states  of  noble  liu man  life.-" 

I  remain,  !Sir,  yours,  etc., 


J.  IIUSKIN. 


Denmark  TTnJi. 


[From  "  The  Asiatic."  May  23,  1871.] 

'THE  QVEEN  OF  THE  AIR" 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Asiatic" 

Sir  :  I  am  obliged  and  flattered  by  the  tone  of  your  article 
on  my  "  Queen  of  the  Air"  in  your  last  number,  but  not  at  all 
by  the  substance  of  it ;  and  it  so  much  misinterprets  my 
attempt  in  that  book  that  I  will  ask  your  leave  to  correct  it  in 
main  points.f  The  ^'  Queen  of  the  Air"  was  written  to  show, 
not  what  could  be  fancied,  but  what  was  felt  and  meant,  in  the 
myth  of  Athena.  Every  British  sailor  knows  that  [N'eptune  is 
the  god  of  the  sea.  lie  does  not  know  that  Athena  is  the 
goddess  of  the  air;  I  doubt  if  many  of  our  school-l)oys  know 
it — I  doubt  even  if  many  of  our  school-masters  know  it ;  and 
I  believe  the  evidence  of  it  given  in  the  "  Queen  of  the  Air" 
to  be  the  flrst  clear  and  connected  approximate  proof  of  it 
which  has  yet  been  rendered  by  scientific  mythology,  properly 
60  called. 

You  say,  "  I  have  not  attempted  to  explain  all  mythology." 

*See  "Sesame  and  Lilies"  (Ruskin's  AVorks,  vol.  i.),  p.  89,  note. 
"  Coventr}'  Patmorc.  You  cannot  read  bim  too  often  or  too  carefully;  as 
far  as  I  know  he  is  the  only  living  poet  who  always  strengthens  and 
purifies;  the  others  sometimes  darken,  and  nearly  always  depress  and  dis- 
courage, the  imagination  they  deeply  seize." 

f  The  article  was  entitled  "  Aryan  Mythology:  Second  Notice,"  the  first 
notice  having  been  a  review  of  Mr.  Gladstone's  ". Inventus  Mundi,"  and  of 
some  other  mythological  works.  (See  the  Asiatic,  April  2o  and  May  16, 
1871.)  The  nature  of  the  praise  and  criticism  of  the  article  may  be  gathered 
from  this  letter. 


•172  MISCELLAXEOUS    LETTEKS.  [1855. 

I  wonder  what  jou  would  have  said  of  me  if  I  Jiad  ?  I  only 
know  a  little  piece  of  it  here  and  there,  just  as  I  know  a  crag 
of  alp  or  a  bend  of  river;  and  even  what  I  know  could  not  be 
put  into  a  small  octavo  volume.  Nevertheless,  I  should  have 
had  another  such  out  bj  this  time  on  the  Apolline  Myths,  and, 
perhaps,  one  on  the  Earth-Gods,  but  for  my  Oxford  work ; 
and  shall  at  all  events  have  a  little  more  to  say  on  the  matter 
than  I  have  yet  said — and  much  need  there  is — when  all  that 
has  yet  been  done  by  "  scientific"  mythology  ends  in  the  asser- 
tion made  by  your  reviewer,  that  "  mythology  is  useful  mainly 
as^a  storehouse  for  poets,  and  for  literary  men  in  want  of  some 
simile  or  metaj)hor  to  produce  a  striking  effect." 
I  am,  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

John  E.uskin. 

May  18,  1871 


I 


[From  "The  Moniing  Chronicle,"  January  20,   1855.     (Reprinted  in  "The  Evening 
Journal,"  January  22.)] 


THE  ANIMALS   OF  SCRIPTURE:  A  REVIEW* 

Among  the  various  illustrated  w^orks  which  usually  grace 
the  beginning  of  the  year,  has  appeared  one  which,  though  of 
graver  and  less  attractive  character  than  its  companions,  is 
likely  to  occupy  a  more  permanent  place  on  the  library 
shelves.  We  allude  to  "Illustrations  of  Scripture,  by  an 
Animal  Painter,"  a  work  which,  whatever  its  faults  or  weak- 
nesses, shows  at  least  a  singular  power  of  giving  reality  and 
interest  to  scenes  which  are  apt  to  be  but  feebly,  if  at  all, 
brought  before  the  mental  vision,  in  consequence  of  our 
familiarity  wutli  the  w^ords  which  describe  them.  The  idea 
of  the  work  is  itself  sufficiently  original.     The  animals  are 

*  The  full  title  of  the  book  here  reviewed  by  Mr.  Ruskin,  and  long  since 
out  of  print,  was  "Twenty  Photographs;  being  illustrations  of  Scripture. 
By  an  Animal  Painter;  with  Notes  by  a  Naturalist."  Imperial  4to.  Edin- 
burgh: Constable,  1854.  The  work  was,  however,  reprinted,  with  engrav- 
ings of  the  photographs,  in  Oood  Words  for  1861. 


1855.]  LETTERS   ON   CRITICISM.  173 

throughout  principal,  and  tlie  pathos  or  moral  of  the  passage 
to  be  illustrated  is  developed  from  its  apparently  subordinate 
purt  in  it.  Thus  the  luxury  and  idolatry  of  the  reign  of 
Solomon  are  hinted  behind  a  group  of  *' apes  and  peacocks;" 
the  Deluge  is  subordinate  to  the  dove  ;  and  the  healing  of  the 
lunatic  at  Gennesareth  to  the  destruction  of  the  herd  of  swine. 

In  general,  to  approach  an  object  from  a  uew  point  of 
view  is  to  place  it  in  a  clearer  light,  and  perhaps  the  very 
strangeness  of  the  treatment  in  some  cases  renders  the  subject 
more  impressive  than  it  could  have  been  made  by  any  more 
regular  method  of  conception.  But,  at  all  events,  supposing 
the  studies  of  the  artist  to  have  been  chiefly  directed  to 
animals,  and  her  power  to  lie  principally  in  seizing  their 
character,  she  is  to  be  thanked  for  filling  her  sketches  of  the 
inferior  creatures  with  so  much  depth  of  meaning,  and  render- 
ing the  delineation  even  of  an  ape,  or  a  swallow,  suggestive  of 
the  most  solemn  trains  of  thought. 

As  so  suggestive,  without  pretence  or  formalism,  these 
drawings  deserve  a  place  of  peculiar  honor  in  the  libraries  of 
the  young,  while  there  are  also  some  qualities  in  them  which 
fit  them  for  companionship  with  more  elaborate  works  of  art. 
The  subject  of  "Lazarus"  is  treated  with  a  courage  and 
tenderness  which  say  much  for  the  painter's  imagination,  and 
more  for  her  heart ;  and  the  waste  of  waters  above  which 
the  raven  hovers  is  expressed,  though  rudely,  yet  in  a  way 
which  tells  of  many  an  hour  spent  in  watching  the  play  of 
the  evening  light  upon  the  movement  of  the  wearied  sea. 
It  is  true  that  most  of  the  compositions  are  weakened  by  a 
very  visible  contempt,  if  not  ignorance,  of  the  laws  which 
regulate  the  harmonies  of  shade,  as  well  as  by  a  painful 
deficiency  in  the  drawing.  Still  there  is  a  life  and  sincerity 
in  them  w^hich  are  among  the  rarest  qualities  in  art ;  and  one 
characteristic,  very  remarkable  in  the  works  of  a  person 
described  in  the  text  (we  doubt  not,  much  against  her  will) 
as  an  "  accomplished  lady" — we  mean  the  peculiar  tendency 
to  conceptions  of  fcarfulncss,  or  horror,  rather  than  of  beauty. 
The  camel,  for  instance,  might,  we  should  have  thought,  as 


174  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTEES.  [1854. 

easily,  and  to  many  persons  mucli  more  pleasingly,  have  illus- 
trated the  meeting  of  Rebekali  with  the  servant  of  Abraham, 
as  the  desolation  of  Eabbah ;  and  the  dog  might  as  gracefully 
have  been  brought  forward  to  remind  us  of  the  words  of  the 
Syro-Phoenician  woman,  as  to  increase  the  horror  of  the  death 
of  Jezebel.  There  are  curious  evidences  of  a  similar  disposi- 
tion in  some  of  the  other  plates  ;  and  while  it  appears  to  us 
indicative  of  the  strength  of  a  mind  of  no  common  order,  we 
would  caution  the  fair  artist  against  permitting  it  to  appear 
too  frequently.  It  renders  the  series  of  drawings  in  some 
degree  repulsive  to  many  persons,  and  even  by  those  who  can 
sympathize  with  it  might  sometimes  be  suspected  of  having 
its  root  in  a  sublime  kind  of  affectation. 

We  have  spoken  of  these  studies  as  drawings.  They  are, 
in  fact,  as  good,  being  photographic  fac-similes  of  the  original 
sketches.  The  text  is  copious,  and  useful  as  an  elucidation  of 
the  natural  history  of  Scripture. 


[From  "The  Builder,"  December  9, 1854.] 

*'LIMNEB''  AND  ILLUMINATION* 

{To  the  Editor  of  ''  The  Builder r) 
I  do  not  usually  answer  objections  to  my  written  state- 
ments, otherwise  I  should  waste  my  life  in  idle  controversy ; 
but  as  what  I  say  to  the  workmen  at  the  Architectural  Museum 

*In  his  lecture  on  "the  distinction  between  illumination  and  painting," 
being  the  first  of  a  series  on  Decorative  Color  delivered  at  the  Architectural 
Museum,  Cannon  Street,  Westminster,  Mr.  Ruskin  is  reported  {Builder, 
Nov.  25,  1854)  to  have  said,  "The  line  which  is  given  by  Cary,  'which 
they  of  Paris  call  the  limner's  skill,'  is  not  properly  translated.  The  word 
which  in  the  original  is  '  alluminare,'  does  not  mean  the  limner's  art,  but 
the  art  of  the  illuminator— the  w^riter  and  illuminator  of  books."  In  criticism 
of  this  remark,  "  M.  A.,"  w^riting  to  the  Bnikler  from  Cambridge,  defended 
Carj-'s  translation  by  referring  to  Johnson's  dictionary  to  show  that 
"  limner"  was  after  all  con-upted  from  "  enlumineur,"  i.e.,  "  a  decorator  of 
books  with  initial  pictures."     His  letter  concluded  by  remarking  upon 


1854.]  LETTERS   ON   CRITICISM.  175 

is  necessarily  brief,  and  in  its  words,  though  not  in  its  sub- 
stance, unconsidered,  I  will  answer,  if  you  will  permit  me, 
any  questions  or  cavils  which  you  may  think  worthy  of  admis- 
sion into  your  columnson  the  subject  of  these  lectures. 

I  do  not  know  if  the  Cambridge  correspondent,  whose 
letter  you  inserted  last  week,  is  more  zealous  for  the  honor  of 
Gary,  or  anxious  to  detect  me  in  a  mistake.  If  the  former, 
he  will  lind,  if  he  take  the  trouble  to  look  at  the  note  in  the 
264th  page  of  the  second  volume  of  the  "  Stones  of  Venice," 
that  Gary's  reputation  is  not  likely  to  suffer  at  my  hands.* 
But  the  translation  in  the  instance  quoted  is  inadmissible.  It 
does  not  matter  in  the  least  whence  the  word  "limner"  is 
derived.  I  did  not  know  when  I  found  fault  with  it  that  it 
was  a  corruption  of  ''  illuminator,"  but  I  knew  perfectly  that 
it  did  not  in  the  existing  state  of  the  English  language  mean 
"illuminator."  No  one  talks  of  'Mimning  a  missal,"  or  of  a 
"limned  missal."  The  word  is  now  universally  understood  as 
signifying  a  painter  or  draughtsman  in  the  ordinary  sense,  and 
cannot  be  accepted  as  a  translation  of  the  phrase  of  which  it 
is  a  corruption. 

Touching  the  last  clause  of  the  letter,  I  should  have 
thought  that  a  master  of  arts  of  Cambridge  might  have  had 
wit  enough  to  comprehend  that  characters  may  be  illegible  by 

another  of  Mr.  Raskin's  statements  in  the  same  lecture,  namelj%  that  "  Black 
letter  is  not  really  illegible,  it  is  only  that  we  are  not  accustomed  to  it. 
.  .  .  The  fact  is,  7io  kind  of  character  is  really  illegible.  If  you  wish  to 
see  real  illegibility,  go  to  the  Houses  of  Parliament  and  look  at  the  inscrip- 
tions there!" 

The  present  letter  was  ^v^itten  in  reply  to  "  M.  A.,"  from  whom  the 
latter  portion  of  it  elicited  a  further  letter,  together  with  one  from 
"Vindex,"  in  defence  of  Sir  Charles  Barry  and  the  Houses  of  Parlia- 
ment (see  the  Builder,  Dec.  16,  1854). 

*  "  It  is  generally  better  to  read  ten  lines  of  any  poet  in  the  original 
language,  however  painfully,  than  ten  cantos  of  a  translation.  But  an 
exception  maybe  made  in  favor  of  Gary's  'Dante.'  If  no  poet  ever  was 
liable  to  lose  more  in  translation,  none  was  ever  so  carefully  translated;  and 
I  hardly  know  whether  most  to  admire  the  rigid  fidelity,  or  the  sweet  and 
solemn  harmony,  of  Cary's  verse,"  etc.  See  the  note  to  the  "Stones  of 
Venice,"  at  the  above-named  page. 


176  MISCELLAISTEOUS    LETTERS.  [1878. 

being  far  off,  as  well  as  bj  being  ill-shaped ;  and  that  it  is  not 
less  difficult  to  read  what  is  too  small  to  be  seen  than  what  is 
too  strange  to  be  understood.  The  inscriptions  on  the  Houses 
of  Parliament  are  illegible,  not  because  they  are  in  black 
letters,  but  because,  like  all  the  rest  of  the  work  on  that,  I 
suppose,  the  most  effeminate  and  effectless  heap  of  stones  ever 
raised  by  man,  they  are  utterly  unfit  for  their  position. 

J.    EUSKIN. 


[From  the  "  Transactions  of  the  New  Shakspere  Society"  for  1878-9,  pp.  409-12.] 

NOTES  ON  A   WORD  IN  SHAKESPEARE* 

"And  yon  gray  lines 
HhaXfret  the  clouds  are  messengers  of  day." 

Julius  C^sar,  II.  i.  103-4. 

I. 

BrANTWOOD,  C0NIST02T,  LANCASHIRE. 

My  dear  Fuenivall  :  Of  course,  in  any  great  writer's 
word,  the  question  is  far  less  what  the  word  came  from,  than 
where  it  has  come  to.  Fret  means  all  manner  of  things  in 
that  place  ;  primarily,  the  rippling  of  clouds — as  sea  by  wind ; 
secondarily,  the  breaking  it  asunder  for  light  to  come  through. 
It  implies  a  certain  degree  of  vexation — some  dissolution —  j 
much  order ^  and  extreme  beauty.  I  have  myself  used  this 
word  substantively,  to  express  the  rippled  edge  of  a  wing- 
feather.  In  architecture  and  jewellery  it  means  simply  rough- 
ening in  a  decorative  manner. f 

Ever  affectionately  yours, 

J.    RiTSKIN. 

f  In  modern  English  '^  chasing"  has  got  confused  with  it,  but 
it  should  be  separated  again. 

*This  and  the  next  letter  were  "written  in  answer  to  Mr,  Fumivall,  who, 
upon  being  questioned  what  appearance  in  the  clouds  was  intended  by  the 
word  "  fret  "  in  the  above  passage,  refen-ed  the  point  to  Mr.  Riiskin,  whose 
answers  were  subsequently  read  at  the  forty-fifth  meeting  of  the  Society, 
Oct.  11,  1878. 


1878.J  LETTERS  ON   CRITICISM,  177 

NOTES  ON  A    WORD  IN  SHAKESPEARR 

II. 

Edinburgh,  29/A  i<ept.,  1878. 
Dear  Furnivall:    Your  kind  letter  comes  to  nie  here, 
and  I  must  answer  on  this  paper,  fui-,  if  that  bit  of  note  is 
really  of  any  use  to  you,  you  must  please  add  this  word  or 
two  more,  in  printing,  as  it  wouldn't  do  to  let  it  be  such  a 
mere  fret  on  the  vault  of  its  subject.     You  say  not  one  man 
in  150  knows  what  the  line  means :  my  dear  Furnivall,  not 
one  man  in  15,000,  in  the  19th  century,  knows,  or  ever  can 
know,  what  any  line — or  any  woixl  means,  used  by  a  great 
waiter.     For  most  words  stand  for  things  that  are  seen,  or 
things  that  are  thought  of ;  and  in  the  19th  century  there  is 
certainly  not  one  man  in  15,000  who  ever  looks  at  anything, 
and  not  one  in  15,000,000  capable  of  a  thought.     Take  the 
intelligence  of  this  word  in  this  line  for  example — the  root  of 
the  whole  matter  is,  first,  that  the  reader  should  have  seen 
what  he  has  often  heard  of,  but  probably  not  seen  twice  in 
ihis  life — "Daybreak."     Next,  it  is  needful  he  should  tliink 
Jilwhat  "break"  means  in  that  word — what  is  broken,  namely, 
liand  by  what.     That  is  to  say,  the  cloud  of  night  is  Broken  up, 
1 1  as  a  city  is  broken  up  (Jerusalem,  when  Zedekiah  fled),  as  a 
:^|school  breaks  up,  as  a  constitution,  or  a  ship,  is  broken  up  ;  in 
^)| every  case  with  a  not  inconsiderable  change  of  idea  and  addi- 
tion to  the  central  word.     This  breaking  up  is  done  by  the 
Day,  which  breaks — out,  as  a  man  breaks,  or  bursts  out,  from 
liis  restraint  in  a  passion ;  breaks  down  in  tears;  or  breaks  in, 
as  from  heaven  to  earth — with  a  breach  in  the  cloud-wall  of 
it ;  or  breaks  out,  with  a  sense  of  outward — as  the  sun — out 
and   out,   farther   and   farther,    after   rain.     "Well;  next,  the 
thing  that  the  day  breaks  up  is  partly  a  garment,  rent,  more 
than  broken ;  a  tnantle,  the  day  itself  "  in  russet  mantle  clad  " 
— the  blanket  of  the  dark,  torn  to  be  peeped  througli — where- 
on instantly  you  get  into  a  whole  host  of  new  ideas  ;  fretting 


178  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1878.     ' 

as  a  motli  frets  a  garment ;  unravelling  at  the  edge,  after- 
wards;— tlience  you  get  \\\\.o  fringe^  whicli  is  an  entirely! 
double  word,  meaning  partly  a  thing  that  guards,  and  partly  \ 
a  thing  that  is  worn  away  on  the  ground ;  the  French  Frange  I 
has,  I  believe,  a  reminiscence  of  cppaaaco  in  it — our  "  fringe"  L 
runs  partly  toward  fi'ico  and  friction — both  are  essentially  I 
connected  with  frango,  and  the  fringe  of  "  breakers"  at  the  ]' 
shores  of  all  seas,  and  the  breaking  of  the  ripples  and  foam  all  a 
over  them — but  this  is  wholly  different  in  a  northern  mind,  | 
which  has  only  seen  the  sea  I 

Break,  break,  break,  on  its  cold  gray  stones,—  ;' 

and  a  southern,  which  has  seen  a  hot  sea  on  hot  sand  break  ii 
into  lightning  of  phosphor  flame — ^half  a  mile  of  fire  in  an  |^ 
instant  —  following  in  time,  like  the  flash  of  minute-guns.  | 
Then  come  the  great  new  ideas  of  order  and  time,  and 

I  did  but  tell  lier  she  mistook  her  frets, 
And  bowed  her  hand,  etc., 

and  so  the  timely  succession  of  either  ball,  flower,  or  dentil,  in 
architecture :  but  this,  again,  going  off  to  a  totally  different 
and  still  lovely  idea,  the  main  one  in  the  word  aurifrigium — 
which  rooted  once  in  aurifex,  went  on  in  Etruscan  work,  ' 
followed  in   Florence  into   a  much   closer    connection  with 
frigidics — their  style  being   always  in  frosted  gold  (see  the! 
dew  on  a  cabbage-leaf  or,  better,  on  a  gray  lichen,  in  early  ' 
sunshine) — going  back,  nobody  knows  how  far,   but  to  the 
Temple  of  the  Dew  of  Athens,  and  gold  of  Mycense,  anyhow ; 
and  in  Eti-uria  to  the  Deluge,  I  suppose.     Well,  then,  the 
notion  of  the  miisic  of  morning  comes  in — with  strings  of  lyre 
{oY  frets  of  Katharine's  instrument,    whatever  it   was)   and 
stops  of  various  quills ;  which  gets  us  into  another  group  i 
beginning  with  plectrum^  going  aside  again  into  ;plico  and| 
plight^  and  Milton's 

**  Play  in  the  ^ghted  clouds" 

(the  quills  on  the  fretful  porcupine  are  all  thought  of,  first, 
in  their  piped  complexity  like  rushes,  hefore  the  standing  upi 


issO.]  LETTERS   ON   CRITICISM.  179 

111  ill-temper),  and  so  on  into  the  pUglit  of  folded  drapery, 
and  round  again  to  our  blanket.  I  think  that's  enough  to 
-ketch  out  the  compass  of  the  word.  Of  course  the  real 
power  of  it  in  any  place  depends  on  the  writer's  grasp  of  it, 
and  use  of  the  facet  he  wants  to  cut  with. 


[From  "The  Theatre,"  March  1880,  p.  169.] 

''THE  MEUGEANT  OF  VENICE."* 

6t?i  Feb.,  1880. 

I  have  no  doubt  that  whatever  Mr.  Irving  has  stated  that 
I  said,  I  did  say.  But  in  personal  address  to  an  artist,  to 
wliom  one  is  introduced  for  the  first  time,  one  does  not  usually 
>ay  all  that  may  be  in  one's  mind.  And  if  expressions, 
limited,  if  not  even  somewhat  exaggerated,  by  courtesy,  be 
afterwards  quoted  as  a  total  and  carefully-expressed  criticism, 
the  general  reader  will  be — or  may  be  easily — much  misled. 
I  did  and  do  much  admire  Mr.  Irving's  own  acting  of  Shylock. 
I'ut  I  entirely  dissent  (and  indignantly  as  well  as  entirely) 
from  his  general  reading  and  treatment  of  the  play.  And  I 
tliink  that  a  modem  audience  will  invariably  be  not  only 
wrong,  but  diametrically  and  with  polar  accuracy  opposite  to, 
the  real  view  of  any  great  author  in  the  moulding  of  his  work. 

So  far  as  I  could  in  kindness  venture,  I  expressed  my  feel- 

*  The  circumstances  connected  with  the  present  letter,  or  rather  extract 
troin  one,  are  as  follows:  After  witnessing  the  performance  of  "  The  Mer- 
<  lumt  of  Venice"  at  the  Lyceum  Theatre,  ^Fr.  Ruskin  had  some  conversation 
\\  ith  Mr.  Irving  on  the  subject.  In  the  Theatre  of  January-  1880 — p.  6^3 — 
.il)peared  a  paragraph  which  stated  that  at  the  interview  named  Mr.  Ruskin 
li;i(l  declared  Mr.  Irving's  "  Shylock"  to  be  "  noble,  tender,  and  true,"  and 
ii  is  to  that  statement  that  the  present  letter,  which  appeared  in  the  3Iarch 
number  of  the  Theatre,  relates.  With  reference  to  the  letter  privately 
addressed  to  Mr.  Irving,  the  Theatre  of  April  (p.  249)  had  a  note  to  the 
ilTect  that  Mr.  Irving  had,  for  excellent  and  commendable  reasons,  pre- 
ferred it  not  being  made  public.  For  a  full  statement  of  Mr.  Ruskin's  views 
of  "  The  Merchant  of  Venice,"  see  "  Munera  Pulveris,"  p.  102. 


180  MISCELLANEOUS   LETTERS.  [1880. 

ings  to  that  effect,  in  a  letter  which  I  wrote  to  Mr.  Irving  on 
the  day  after  I  saw  the  play;  and  I  should  be  sincerely 
obliged  to  him,  under  the  existing  circumstances,  if  he  would 
publish  THE  WHOLE  of  that  letter. 


RECITATIONS. 


Sheffield,  Wh  February,  1880. 
My  dear  Sir  :*  I  am  most  happy  to  assure  you,  in  reply 
to  your  interesting  letter  of  the  12th,  that  I  heard  your  daugh- 
ters' recitations  in  London  last  autumn,  with  quite  unmixed 
pleasure  and  the  sincerest  admiration — nor  merely  that,  but 
with  grave  cliange  in  my  opinions  of  the  general  value  of 
recitations  as  a  means  of  popular  instruction.  Usually,  I  like 
better  to  hear  beautiful  poetry  read  quietly  than  recited  with 
action.  But  I  felt,  in  hearing  Shelley's  "Cloud"  recited  (I 
think  it  was  by  Miss  Josephine)  that  I  also  was  "  one  of  the 
jDcople,"  and  understood  the  poem  better  than  ever  before, 
though  I  am  by  way  of  knowing  something  about  clouds,  too. 
I  also  know  the  "  Jackdaw  of  Eheims"  pretty  nearly  by  heart ; 
but  I  would  gladly  come  to  London  straightway,  had  I  the 
time,  to  hear  Miss  Peggy  speak  it  again.  And — in  fine — I 
have  not  seen  any  public  entertainment — for  many  a  long  year 
— at  once  so  sweet,  so  innocent,  and  so  helpful,  as  that  which 
your  children  can  give  to  all  the  gentle  and  simple  in  mind 
and  heart. — Believe  me,  my  dear  Sir,  faithfully,  and  with  all 
felicitation,  yours, 

J.  KUSKIN. 

*This  letter  was  addressed  to  Mr.  R.  T.  Webling,  by  whom  it  was 
afterwards  printed  as  a  testimonial  of  the  interest  and  success  of  his 
daughters'  recitations.    It  was  reprinted  in  the  Daily  News  (Feb.  18,  1880). 


APPENDIX. 


Letter  to  W.  C.  Bennett,  LL.D.     1852. 

Letter  to  Thomas  Guthrie,  D.D.     1853. 

Mr.  Windus'  Sale  of  Pictures.     1859. 

At  the  Play.     1867. 

An  Object  of  Charity.     1868. 

Excuses  prom  Correspondence.    1868. 

Letter  to  the  Author  of  a  TJeview.     1872. 

An  Oxford  Protest.     1875. 

Mr.  Ruskin  and  Mji.  Lowe.     1877. 

The  Bibliography  of  Buskin.     1878. 
(Two  Letters:  September  30,  and  October  23.) 

The  Society  of  the  Rose.    1879. 


APPENDIX. 


[From  the  "  Testimonials"  of  W.  C.  Bemiett,  LL.D.    1871;  p.  22.] 

LETTER   TO   W.   C.  BEXNETT,  LL.D.* 

Herne  Hill,  Dulwich,  December  28th,  1852. 
Dear  Mr.  Be5?"NETT:  I  hope  this  line  will  arrive  in  time  to 
wish  you  and  yours  a  happy  New  Year,  and  to  assure  you  of  the 
great  pleasure  I  had  in  receiving  your  poems  from  you,  and  of 
the  continual  pleasure  I  shall  have  m  possessing  them.  I 
deferred  writing  to  you  in  order  that  I  might  tell  you  how 
I  liked  those  which  were  new  to  me,  but  Christmas,  and  certain 
little  "pattering  pairs  of  restless  shoes"  which  have  somehow  or 
another  got  into  the  house  in  his  train,  have  hitherto  prevented 
me  from  settling  myself  for  a  quiet  read.  In  fact,  I  am  terribly 
afraid  of  being  quite  turned  upside  down  when  I  do,  so  as 
to  lose  my  own  identity,  for  you  have  already  nearhj  made  me 
like  babies,  and  I  see  an  ode  further  on  to  another  antipathy  of 
mine — the  only  one  I  have  in  the  kingdom  of  flowers — the  chry- 
santhemum. However,  I  am  sure  you  will  be  well  pleased  if  you 
can  cure  me  of  all  dislikes.  I  should  write  to  you  now  more 
cheerfully,  but  that  I  am  anxious  for  the  person  who,  of  all  I 
know,  has  fewest  dislikes  and  warmest  likings — for  Miss  Mitford. 

*The  present  letter  is  from  the  "  Testimonials  of  W.  C.  Bennett,  LL  D., 
Candidate  for  the  Clerkship  of  the  London  School  Board."  The  pamphlet 
consists  of  "letters  from  distinguished  men  of  the  time."  and  includes  some 
from  Mr.  Carlyle,  Mr.  Tennyson,  Mr.  Browning,  Charles  Dickens,  and 
others.  Mr.  Ruskin's  letter  was  originally  addressed  to  ^Ir.  Bennett  in 
thanks  for  a  copy  of  his  "  Poems"  (Chapman  and  Hall.  1850).  The  poems 
specially  allued  to  are  "Toddling  May"  (from  which  Mr.  Riiskin  quotes), 
"Baby  May,"  and  another,  "To  the  Chrysanthemum."  The  book  is  dedi- 
cated to  Miss  Mitford. 


184  APPEKDIX.  [1853. 

I  trust  she  is  better,  and  that  she  may  be  spared  for  many  years 
to  come.  I  don't  know  if  England  has  such  another  warm 
heart. 

I  hope  I  may  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  you  here  in  case 
your  occasions  should  at  any  time  bring  you  to  London,  and 
I  remain,  with  much  respect,  most  truly  yours, 

J.  RusKiiq^. 


[Trom  the  •'  Memoir  of  Thomas  Guthrie,  D.D."    Vol.  ii.  pp.  321-2  (1875).] 

LETTER  TO  DM.  GUTHBIE* 

Saturday,  2Qth,  1853. 

I  found  a  little  difficulty  in  writing  the  words  on  the  first 
page,  wondering  whether  you  would  think  the  "  affectionate" 
misused  or  insincere.  But  I  made  up  my  mind  at  last  to  write 
what  I  felt;  believing  that  you  must  be  accustomed  to  people's 
getting  very  seriously  and  truly  attached  to  you,  almost  at  first 
sight,  and  therefore  would  believe  me. 

You  asked  me,  the  other  evening,  some  kind  questions  about 
my  father.  He  was  an  Edinburgh  boy,  and  in  answer  to  some 
account  by  me  of  the  pleasure  I  had  had  in  hearing  you,  and  the 
privilege  of  knowing  you,  as  also  of  your  exertions  in  the  cause 
of  the  Edinburgh  poor,  he  desires  to  send  you  the  enclosed,  to 
be  applied  by  you  in  such  manner  as  you  may  think  fittest  for 
the  good  of  his  native  city.  I  have  added  slightly  to  my  father's 
trust.  I  wish  I  could  have  done  so  more  largely,  but  my  pro- 
fession of  fault-finding  with  the  world  in  general  is  not  a  lucra- 
tive one. 

Always  respectfully  and  affectionately  yours, 

J.  EUSKIN. 

*  This  letter  accompanied  the  gift  of  a  copy  of  "  The  Stones  of  Venice," 
sent  to  Dr.  Gutlirie  by  IMr.  Ruskin,  who,  while  residing  in  Edinburgh 
during  the  whiter  of  1853,  '*  was  to  be  found  each  Sunday  afternoon  in  St. 
John's  Free  Church." 


I  1867.J  APPENDIX.  186 

[From  "  The  Times,"  March  89, 1869.] 

THE  SALE  OF  MR.  WINBUS'  PICTUBES. 

"o  the  EdiUyr  of  "  TJie  Tiiius." 

Sir:  Will  you  oblige  me  by  correcting  an  error  in  your 
ccoiint  given  this  morning  of  the  sale  of  Mr.  Windus'  pictures 
n  Saturday,*  in  which  the  purchase  of  Mr.  Millais's  picture 
'  Pot  Pourri"  is  attributed  to  me  ?  I  neither  purchased  Mr.  Mil- 
iis's  picture,  nor  any  other  picture  at  that  sale. 

I  have  the  honor  to  be,  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J.  RUSKIK. 
Denmark  Hill,  March  28. 


[From  "  The  PaU  MaU  Gazette,"  March  1, 1867.] 

AT  THE  PLAY. 

|1>  the  Editor  of  "  The  PaU  Mall  Gazette." 

Sir:  I  am  writing  a  series  of  private  letters  on  matters  of 
olitical  economy  to  a  working  man  in  Newcastle,  without 
objecting  to  his  printing  them,  but  writing  just  as  I  should  if 
liey  were  for  his  eye  only.  I  necessarily  take  copies  of  them  for 
Inference,  and  the  one  I  sent  him  last  Monday  seems  to  me  not 
nlikely  to  interest  some  of  yaur  readers  who  care  about  modem 
rama.     So  I  send  you  the  copy  of  it  to  use  if  you  like.f 

Truly  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 
Denmauk  Hill,  Feb.  28,  1867. 

*  The  collection  of  pictures  belonc:ing  to  Mr.  B.  G.  Windus  was  sold  by 
[essrs.  Christie  and  Manson  on  March  26,  1859. 
fThe  enclosed  letter  is  "  Letter  V."  of  "  Time  and  Tide." 


186  APPENDIX. 


[From  "  The  Daily  Telegraph,"  January  22, 1868.] 
AN  OBJECT  OF  CHARITY* 

To  the  Editor  of  "  The  Daily  Telegraph.'' 

Sir:  Except  in  *^  Gil  Bias,"  I  never  read  of  anything  Astraean 
on  the  earth  so  perfect  as  the  story  in  your  fourth  article  to-day. 

I  send  you  a  check  for  the  Chancellor.  If  40,  in  legal 
terms,  means  400,  you  must  explain  the  further  requirements  to 
your  impulsive  public. 

I  am.  Sir,  your  faithful  servant, 

J.  KUSKIN^. 
Denmark  Hill,  S.,  Jan.  21,  1868. 


EXCUSES  FROM  CORRESPONDENCE. 

Denmark  Hill,  S., 

2d  February,  1868. 

I  am  about  to  enter  on  some  work  which  cannot  be  well  done 
or  even  approximately  well,  unless  without  interruption,  and  it 
would  be  desirable  for  me,  were  it  in  my  power,  to  leave  home 

*Tlie  Daily  Telegraph  of  January  21,  1868,  contained  a  leading  article 
upon  the  following  facts.  It  appeared  that  a  girl,  named  Matilda  Griggs, 
had  been  nearly  murdered  by  her  seducer,  who,  after  stabbing  her  in  no  less 
than  thirteen  different  places,  had  then  left  her  for  dead.  She  had,  how- 
ever, still  strength  enough  to  crawl  into  a  field  close  by,  and  there  swooned. 
The  assistance  that  she  met  with  in  this  plight  was  of  a  rare  kind.  Two 
calves  came  up  to  her,  and  disposing  themselves  on  either  side  of  her  bleed- 
ing body,  thus  kept  her  warm  and  partly  sheltered  from  cold  and  rain. 
Temporarily  preserved,  the  girl  eventually  recovered,  and  entered  into 
recognizances,  under  a  sum  of  forty  pounds,  to  prosecute  her  murderous 
lover.  But  "she  loved  much,"  and,  failing  to  prosecute,  forfeited  her 
recognizances,  and  was  imprisoned  by  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  for 
her  debt.  "  Pity  this  poor  debtor,"  wrote  the  Daily  Telegraph,  and  in  the 
next  day's  issue  appeared  the  above  letter,  probably  not  intended  for  the 
publication  accorded  to  it. 


1872:]  APPENDIX.  187 

for  some  time,  and  carry  out  my  undertaking  in  seclusion.  But 
as  my  materials  are  partly  in  London,  I  cannot  do  this;  so  that 
my  only  alternative  is  to  ask  you  to  think  of  me  as  if  actually 
absent  from  England,  and  not  to  be  displeased  though  I  must 
decline  all  correspondence.  And  I  pray  you  to  trust  my  assur- 
ance that,  whatever  reasons  I  may  have  for  so  uncouth  behavior, 
none  of  them  are  inconsistent  with  the  respect  and  regard  in 
which  I  remain, 

Faithfully  yours,* 


[From  "The  Liverpool  Weekly  Albion,"  November  9,  1872.] 

LETTER  TO   THE  AUTHOR  OF  A  REVIEW.\ 

Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford, 
Wednesday,  dOth  Oct. 

[My  Dear]  Sir:  I  was  on  the  point  of  writing  to  the  Editor 
of  The  Albion  to  ask  the  name  of  the  author  of  that  article.    Of 

*  The  above  letter,  printed  as  a  circular,  was  at  one  time  used  by  Mr. 
Riiskin  in  reply  to  part  of  his  large  correspondence.  Some  few  copies  had 
the  date  printed  on  them  as  above.  The  following  is  a  similar  but  more 
recent  excuse,  printed  at  the  end  of  the  last  "  list  of  works"  issued  (March, 
1880)  by  Mr.  Ruskin's  publisher: 

Mr.  Ruskin  has  always  hitherto  found  his  correspondents  under  the  im- 
pression that,  when  he  is  able  for  average  literary  work,  he  oan  also  answer 
any  quantity  of  letters.  lie  most  respectfully  and  sorrowfully  mast  pray 
them  to  observe,  that  it  is  precisely  when  he  is  in  most  active  general  occupa- 
tion that  he  can  answer  fewest  private  letters;  and  this  year  he  proposes  to 

answer none,  except  those  on  St.   George's  business.      There  will  be 

enough  news  of  him,  for  any  who  care  to  get  them,  in  the  occasional 
numbers  of  "  Fors." 

f  The  review  was  the  first  of  three  articles  entitled  "  The  Disciple  of  Art 
and  the  Votary  of  Science,"  published  in  the  Livei'iwol  Weekly  Albion  of 
November  9,  16,  and  23,  1873.  The  first  of  them  had  also  appeared  pre- 
viously in  the  Livei'pool  Daily  Albion,  nnd 'was  reprinted  with  the  present 
letter  in  the  weekly  issue  of  Nov.  9.  The  aim  of  the  articles  was  partly  to 
show  how  the  question  "  AVhat  is  Art?"  involved  a  .second  and  deeper 
inquiry,  "  What  is  Man? '  The  words  bracketed  here  were  omitted  in  the 
Albion,  but  occur  in  the  original  letter,  for  access  to  which  I  have  to  thank 
the  writer  of  the  articles. 


188  APPENDIX.  [1874, 

course,  one  likes  praise  [and  I'm  so  glad  of  it  that  I  can  take  a 
great  many  kinds],  but  I  never  got  any  [that]  I  liked  so  much 
before,  because,  as  far  as  I  [can]  remember  nobody  ever  noticed 
or  allowed  for  the  range  of  work  I've  had  to  do,  and  which  really 
has  been  dreadfully  costly  and  painful  to  me,  compelling  me  to 
leave  things  just  at  the  point  when  one's  work  on  them  has 
become  secure  and  delightsome,  to  attack  them  on  another 
rough  side.  It  is  a  most  painful  manner  of  life,  and  I  never  got 
any  credit  for  it  before.  But  the  more  I  see,  the  more  I  feel  the 
necessity  of  seeing  all  round,  however  hastily. 

I  am  entirely  grateful  for  the  review  and  the  understanding 
of  me;  and  I  needed  some  help  just  now — for  I'm  at  once  single- 
handed  and  dead — or  worse — hearted,  and  as  nearly  beaten  as 
I've  been  in  my  life. 

Always  therefore  I  shall  be,  for  the  encouragement  at  a  heavy 
time.  Very  gratefully  yours, 

(Signed)        J.  Ruskin. 


[From  "  The  Globe,"  October  29, 1874.] 
AN  OXFORD  PROTEST.'^ 


The  Slade  Professor  has  tried  for  five  years  to  please  every- 
body in  Oxford  by  lecturing  at  any  time  that  might  be  con- 
veniently subordinate  to  other  dates  of  study  in  the  University. 
He  finds  he  has  pleased  nobody,  and  must  for  the  future  at  least 
make  his  hour  known  and  consistent.  He  cannot  alter  it  this 
term  because  people  sometimes  come  from  a  distance  and  have 
settled  their  plans  by  the  hours  announced  in  the  Gazette,  but 
for  many  he  reasons  he  thinks  it  right  to  change  the  place,  and 
will  hereafter  lecture  in  the  theatre  of  the  museum. f    On  Friday 

*  Mr.  Ruskin  had  recently  changed  the  hour  of  his  lectures  from  two 
till  twelve,  and  the  latter  hour  clashing  with  other  lectures,  some  complaints 
had  been  made.  This  "  protest  "  was  then  issued  on  the  morning  of  Octo- 
ber 29  and  reprinted  in  the  Olohe  of  the  same  day. 

t  Instead  of  in  the  drawin,":  schools  at  the  Taylor  Gallery. 


1877.]  APPENDIX.  189 

the  30tli  he  will  not  begin  till  half-past  twelve  to  allow  settling 
time.  Afterwards,  all  his  lectures  will  be  at  twelve  in  this  and 
future  terms.  He  feels  that  if  he  cannot  be  granted  so  much  as 
twelve  liours  of  serious  audience  in  working  time  during  the 
whole  Oxford  year,  he  need  not  in  future  prepare  public  lectures 
at  which  his  pupils  need  not  much  regret  their  non-attendance. 


(From  "  The  Standard,"  August  28, 1877.  Reprinted  in  the  "  Notes  and  Correspondence' 
to  "  Fors  Clavigera,"  Letter  81,  September,  1877,  p.  208.] 


MR.  RUSKIN  AND  MR.  LOWE. 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Standard:' 

Sir:  My  attention  has  been  directed  to  an  article  in  your 
columns  of  the  22d  inst. ,  referring  to  a  supposed  correspondence 
between  Mr.  Lowe  and  me.*  Permit  me  to  state  that  the  letter 
in  question  is  not  Mr.  Lowe's.  The  general  value  of  your  article 
as  a  review  of  my  work  and  methods  of  writing  will,  I  trust, 
rather  be  enhanced  than  diminished  by  the  correction,  due  to 
Mr.  Lowe,  of  this  original  error;  and  the  more,  that  your  critic 
in  the  course  of  his  review  expresses  his  not  unjustifiable  con- 
viction that  no  correspondence  between  Mr.  Lowe  and  me  is 
possible  on  any  intellectual  subject  whatever. 

I  am.  Sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

J0H2T   RUSKIX. 
Brantwood,  Coniston,  Lancashire, 
August  24. 

*The  article  in  question  stated  that  a  number  of  "Fors  Clavigera"  liad 
been  sent  to  Mr.  Lowe,  and  commented  on  by  him  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Ruskin 
The  last  words  of  the  article,  alluded  to  above,  were  as  tollows:  "The 
world  will  be  made  no  wiser  by  any  controversy  between  Mr.  Kuskin  and 
Mr.  Lowe,  for  it  would  be  impossible  to  reduce  their  figures  or  facts  to  a 
common  denominator." 


190  APPENDIX.  [1878, 


[From  the  List  of  "Mr.  Shepherd's  Publications"  printed  at  the  end  of  his  "The 
Bibliography  of  Dickens,"  1880.] 


THE  BIBLIOORAPHT  OF  RUSKIN. 


Brantwood,  Coniston, 

Sept.  30,  1878. 

Dear  Sir:  So  far  from  being  distasteful  to  me,  your  perfect 
reckoning  up  of  me  not  only  flatters  my  vanity  extremely,  but 
will  be  in  the  highest  degree  useful  to  myself.  But  you  know 
so  much  more  about  me  than  I  now  remember  about  anything, 
that  I  can't  find  a  single  thing  to  correct  or  add — glancing 
through  at  least. 

I  will  not  say  that  you  have  wasted  your  time;  but  I  may  at 
least  regret  the  quantity  of  trouble  the  book  must  have  given 
you,  and  am,  therefore,  somewhat  ashamedly,  but  very  grate- 
fully yours, 

J.    KUSKIN. 
R.  H.  Shepherd,  Esq. 


II. 

Brantwood,  Coniston, 
Oct  23,  1878. 

Dear  Mr.  Shepherd:  I  am  very  deeply  grateful  to  you,  as 
I  am  in  all  duty  bound,  for  this  very  curious  record  of  myself. 
It  will  be  of  extreme  value  to  me  in  filling  up  what  gaps  I  can 
in  this  patched  coverlid  of  my  life  before  it  is  draped  over  my 
cofiin — if  it  may  be. 

I  am  especially  glad  to  have  note  of  the  letters  to  newspapers, 
but  most  chiefly  to  have  the  good  news  of  so  earnest  and  patient 
a  friend.  Ever  gratefully  yours, 

J.    RUSKIN. 


1880.]  APPENDIX.  191 


[From  the  "  First  Annual  Report "  of  the  "  Ruskin  Society"  (of  the  Rose),  Manchester 

1880.] 


THE  SOCIETY  OF   THE  ROSE* 

*'No,  indeed,  I  don't  want  to  discourage  the  plan  you  have 
so  kindly  and  earnestly  formed,  but  I  could  not  easily  or  decor- 
ously promote  it  myself,  could  I?  But  I  fully  proposed  to  write 
you  a  letter  to  be  read  at  the  first  meeting,  guarding  you 
especially  against  an  *ism,'  or  a  possibility  of  giving  occasion 
for  one ;  and  I  am  exceedingly  glad  to  receive  your  present 
letter.  Mine  was  not  written  because  it  gave  me  trouble  to 
think  of  it,  and  I  can't  take  trouble  now.  But  without  think- 
ing, I  can  at  once  assure  you  that  the  taking  of  the  name  of 
St.  George  ivould  give  me  endless  trouble,  and  cause  all  manner 
of  mistakes,  and  perhaps  even  legal  difficulties.  We  must  not 
have  that,  please. 

^^  But  I  think  you  might  with  grace  and  truth  take  the 
name  of  the  Society  of  the  Rose — meaning  the  English  wild 
rose — and  that  the  object  of  the  society  would  be  to  promote 
such  English  learning  and  life  as  can  abide  where  it  grows. 
You  see  it  is  the  heraldic  sign  on  my  books,  so  that  you  might 
still  keep  pretty  close  to  me. 

''  Sui^posing  this  were  thought  too  far-fetched  or  sentimental 
by  the  promoters  of  the  society,  I  think  the  '  More '  Society 
would  be  a  good  name,  following  out  the  teaching  of  the  Utopia 
as  it  is  taken  up  in  *Fors.'  I  can't  write  more  to-day,  but  I 
dare  say  something  else  may  come  into  my  head,  and  I'll  write 
again,  or  you  can  send  me  more  names  for  choice." 

*  This  letter  was  written  early  in  1879  to  the  Secretary  pro  tern,  of  the 
Riiskiu  Society  of  Manchester,  in  reply  to  a  request  for  Mr.  Ruskin's  views 
upon  the  formation  of  such  a  Society. 


193  APPENDIX.  [1865. 


1 


[From  "  The  Autographic  Mirror,"  December  23  and  80, 1865.1 
LETTER  TO  MR.   W,  H.  HARRISON* 

Dear  Mr.  Harrison":  The  plate  I  send  is  unluckily  merely 
outlined  in  its  principal  griffin  (it  is  just  being  finished),  but  it 
may  render  your  six  nights'  work  a  little  more  amusing.  I 
don't  want  it  back. 

Never  mind  putting  '^see  to  quotations,"  as  I  always  do. 
And,  in  the  second  revise,  don't  look  to  all  my  alterations  to 
tick  them  off,  but  merely  read  straight  through  the  new  proof 
to  see  if  any  mistake  strikes  you.  This  will  be  more  useful  to 
me  than  the  other. 

Most  truly  yours,  with  a  thousand  thanks, 

J.  RusKiif. 

*  A  facsimile  of  this  letter,  from  a  collection  of  autographs  in  the  posses- 
sion of  Mr.  T.  F.  Dillon  Croker,  appeared  in  the  above-named  issue  of  the 
Autographic  Mirror.  The  subject  of  the  letter  will  be  made  clearer  by  the 
following  passages  from  Mr.  Ruskin's  reminiscence  of  Mr.  William  Henry 
Harrison,  published  in  the  University  Magazine  of  April,  1878,  under  the 
title  of  "My  First  Editor."— "  Is^  February,  1878.  In  seven  daj^s  more  I 
shall  be  fifty-nine  ;  which  (practically)  is  all  the  same  as  sixty;  but  being 
asked  by  the  wife  of  my  dear  old  friend,  W.  H.  Harrison,  to  say  a  few 
words  of  our  old  relations  together,  I  find  myself,  in  spite  of  all  these  years, 
a  boy  again— partly  in  the  mere  thought  of,  and  renewed  sympathy  with, 
the  cheerful  heart  of  my  old  literary  master,  and  partly  in  instinctive  terror 
lest,  wherever  he  is  in  celestial  circles,  he  should  catch  me  writing  bad 
grammar,  or  putting  wrong  stops,  and  should  set  the  table  turning,  or  the 
like.  ...  Not  a  book  of  mine,  for  good  thirty  years,  but  went,  every  word 
of  it,  under  his  careful  eyes  tAvice  over — often  also  the  last  revises  left  to 
his  tender  mercy  altogether  on  condition  he  wouldn't  bother  me  any  more." 
— The  book  to  which  the  letter  refers  may  be  the  "  Stones  of  Venice,"  and 
the  plate  sent  the  third  ("  Noble  and  Ignoble  Grotesque"),  in  the  last  volume 
of  that  work;  and  if  this  be  so,  the  letter  was  probably  written  from  Heme 
Hill  about  1853-3. 


1880.]  APPENDIX.  193 

IFrom  the  "  Journal  of  Dramatic  Reform,"  November,  1880.] 
DRAMATIC  REFORM* 

I. 

My  dear  Sir:  Yes,  I  began  writing  something — a  year  ago, 
is  it? — on  your  subject,  but  have  lost  it,  and  am  now  utterly 
too  busy  to  touch  so  difficult  and  so  important  a  subject.  I  shall 
come  on  it,  some  day,  necessarily. 

Meantime,  the  one  thing  I  have  to  say  mainly  is  that  the 
idea  of  making  money  by  a  theatre,  and  making  it  educational 
at  the  same  time,  is  utterly  to  be  got  out  of  people^s  heads. 
You  don't  make  money  out  of  a  Ship  of  the  Line,  nor  should 
you  out  of  a  Church,  nor  should  you  out  of  a  College,  nor 
should  you  out  of  a  Theatre. 

Pay  your  Ship's  officers,  your  Church  officers,  your  College 
tutors,  and  your  Stage  tutors,  what  will  honorably  maintain 
them.  Let  there  be  no  starring  on  the  Stage  boards,  more  than 
on  the  deck,  but  the  Broadside  well  delivered. 

And  let  the  English  Gentleman  consider  with  himself  what 
he  has  got  to  teach  the  people:  perhaps  then,  he  may  tell  the 
English  Actor  what  he  has  to  teach  them. 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

(Signed)  J.  Ruskin. 

Brantwood,  July  30^^,  1880. 

II. 

My  dear  Sir:  I  am  heartily  glad  you  think  my  letter  may 
be  of  some  use.  I  wish  it  had  contained  the  tenth  part  of  what 
I  wanted  to  say. 

May  I  ask  you  at  least  to  add  this  note  to  it,  to  tell  how 

*  This  and  the  following  letter  were  both  addressed  to  Mr.  John  Stuart 
Bogg,  the  Secretary  of  the  Dramatic  Reform  Association  of  Manchester, 
The  first  was  a  reply  to  a  request  that  iMr.  Ruskin  would,  in  accordance 
with  an  old  promise,  write  something  on  the  subject  of  the  Drama  for  the 
Society's  journal ;  and  the  second  was  added  by  its  author  on  hearing  that  it 
was  the  wish  of  the  Society  to  publish  the  first. 


194  \  APPENDIX.  [1880. 

indignant  I  was,  a  few  days  ago,  to  see  the  dvo-p-scene  (!)  of  the 
Folies  at  Paris  composed  of  huge  advertisements!  The  ghastly 
want  of  sense  of  beauty,  and  endurance  of  loathsomeness  gain- 
ing hourly  on  the  people ! 

They  were  playing  the  FiUe  du  Tambour  Major  superbly, 
for  the  most  part ;  they  gave  the  introductory  convent  scene 
without  the  least  caricature,  the  Abbess  being  played  by  a  very 
beautiful  and  gracefully-mannered  actress,  and  the  whole  thing 
would  have  been  delightful  had  the  mere  decorations  of  the 
theatre  been  clean  and  pretty.  To  think  that  all  the  strength 
of  the  world  combining  in  Paris  to  amuse  itself  can't  have  clean 
box-curtains  !  or  a  pretty  landscape  sketch  for  a  drop  scene  ! — 
but  sits  in  squalor  and  dismalness,  with  bills  stuck  all  over  its 
rideau  ! 

I  saw  Le  Chalet  here  last  night,  in  many  respects  well  played 
and  sung,  and  it  is  a  quite  charming  little  opera  in  its  story, 
only  it  requires  an  actress  of  extreme  refinement  for  the  main 
part,  and  everybody  last  night  sang  too  loud.  There  is  no 
music  of  any  high  quality  in  it,  but  the  piece  is  one  which, 
pla3'ed  with  such  delicacy  as  almost  any  clever,  ivellhred  girl 
could  put  into  the  heroine's  part  (if  the  audiences  would  look 
for  acting  more  than  voice),  ought  to  be  extremely  delightful  to 
simple  persons. 

On  the  other  hand,  I  heard  William  Tell  entirely  massacred 
at  the  great  opera-house  at  Paris.  My  belief  is  they  scarcely 
sang  a  piece  of  pure  Eossini  all  night,  but  had  fitted  in  modern 
skimble-skamble  tunes,  and  quite  unspeakably  clumsy  and  com- 
mon hallet.  I  scarcely  came  away  in  better  humor  from  the 
mouthed  tediousness  of  Gerin  at  the  Frangais,  but  they  took 
pains  with  it,  and  I  suppose  it  pleased  a  certain  class  of  audience. 
The  William  Tell  could  please  nobody  at  heart. 

The  libretto  of  Jean  de  Nivelle  is  very  beautiful,  and  ought 
to  have  new  music  written  for  it.  Anything  so  helplessly  tune- 
less as  its  present  music  I  never  heard,  except  mosquitoes  and 
cicadas. 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

(Signed)  J.  Euskik. 

Amiens,  October  \Wi,  1880. 


1880.]  APPENDIX.  195 

[From  the  "  Glasgow  Herald,"  October  7, 1880.] 
THE  LORD  RECTOESHIP  OF  GLASGOW  UNIVERSITY.* 

I. 

Brant  WOOD,  Contston,  Lancashire,  Wh  June,  1880. 

My  dear  Sir  :  I  am  greatly  flattered  by  your  letter,  but 
there  are  two  reasons  why  I  can't  stand — the  first,  that  though  I 
believe  myself  the  stanchest  Conservative  in  the  British  Islands, 
I  hold  some  opinions,  and  must  soon  clearly  utter  them,  con- 
cerning both  lands  and  rents,  which  I  fear  the  Conservative 
Club  would  be  very  far  from  sanctioning,  and  think  Mr.  Bright 
himself  had  been  their  safer  choice.  The  second,  that  I  am  not 
in  the  least  disposed  myself  to  stand  in  any  contest  where  it  is 
possible  that  Mr.  Bright  might  beat  me. 

A^'e  there  really  no  Scottish  gentlemen  of  birth  and  learning 
from  whom  you  could  choose  a  Rector  worthier  than  Mr.  Bright? 
and  better  able  than  any  Southron  to  rectify  what  might  be 
oblique,  or  hold  straight  what  wasn't  yet  so,  in  a  Scottish  Uni- 
versity? 

Might  I  ask  the  favor  of  the  transmission  of  a  copy  of  this 
letter  to  the  Independent  Club?  It  will  save  me  the  difficulty 
of  repetition  in  other  terms. — And  believe  me,  my  dear  sir, 
always  the  club's  and  your  faithful  servant, 

(Signed)  J.  Ruskin-. 

Matt.  P.  Fraser,  Esq. 

II. 

mh  June,  1880. 
My  dear  Sir:   I  am  too  tired  at  this  moment  (I  mean  this 
day  or  two  back)  to  be  able  to  think.     My  health  may  break 

*  Of  these  letters  it  should  be  noted  that  the  first  was  written  to  the 
President  of  the  Conservative  Club  upon  his  requesting  ;Mr.  Ruskin  to  stand 
for  the  Lord  Rectorship;  the  second  in  answer  to  a  hope  that  Mr.  Ruskin 
would  reconsider  the  decision  he  had  expressed  in  his  reply;  and  the  third 
upon  the  receipt  of  a  letter  explaining  what  the  duties  of  the  oftlce  were. 
The  fourth  letter  refers  to  one  which  dealt  with  some  reflections  matle  by 
the  Liberal  Club  upon  the  f(imier  conduct  of  their  opponents. 


196  APPEN-DIX.  [1880. 

down  any  day,  and  I  cannot  bear  a  sense  of  having  to  do  any- 
thing. If  you  would  take  me  on  condition  of  my  residence  for 
a  little  while  with  you,  and  giving  a  little  address  to  the  stu- 
dents after  I  had  seen  something  of  them,  I  think  I  could  come, 
but  I  won't  stand  ceremonies  nor  make  long  speeches,  and  you 
really  should  try  to  get  somebody  else. 

Ever  respectfully  yours, 

(Signed)  J.  RusKiN. 

Matt.  P.  Fbaser,  Es<j. 


ni. 


24:t7i  June,  1880. 

My  dear  Sir:  I  am  grieved  at  my  own  vacillation,  and  fear 
it  is  more  vanity  than  sense  of  duty  in  which  I  leave  this  matter 
of  nomination  to  your  own  pleasure.  But  I  had  rather  err  in 
vanity  than  in  heartlessness,  and  so  will  do  my  best  for  you  if 
you  want  me. 

Ever  respectfully  yours, 

(Signed)  J.  RusKiif. 


IV. 


Rouen,  28th  September,  1880. 

Sir  :  I  am  obliged  by  your  letter,  but  can  absolutely  pay  no 
regard  to  anything  said  or  done  by  Mr.  Bright's  Committee 
beyond  requesting  my  own  committees  to  print  for  their  inspec- 
tion— or  their  use — in  any  way  they  like,  every  word  of  every 
letter  I  have  written  to  my  supporters,  or  non-supporters,  or 
any  other  person  in  Glasgow,  so  far  as  such  letters  may  be 
recoverable. 

Faithfully  yours, 
(Signed)  J.  RusKi]sr. 

Matt.  P.  Fbaser,  Esq. 


1880.]  APPENDIX.  197 


[From  "The  Glasgow  Herald,"  October  12, 1880.] 

Brantwood,  C'oniston,  LANCAsnraE. 

My  dear  Sir:  What  in  the  devil's  name  have  you  to  do 
Avith  either  Mr.  D'Israeli  or  Mr.  Gladstone?  You  are  students 
at  the  University,  and  have  no  more  business  with  politics  than 
you  have  with  rat-catching. 

Had  you  ever  read  ten  words  of  mine  [with  understanding] 
you  would  have  known  that  I  care  no  more  [either]  for  Mr. 
D'Israeli  or  Mr.  Gladstone  than  for  two  old  bagpij^es  with  the 
drones  going  by  steam,  but  that  I  hate  all  Liberalism  as  I  do 
Beelzebub,  and  that,  with  Carlyle,  I  stand,  we  two  alone  now  in 
England,  for  God  and  the  Queen. 

Ever  faithfully  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 
Alex.  Mitchell,  Esq.,  Avoch,  by  Inverness. 

P.S. — You  had  better,  however,  ask  the  Conservatives  for  a 
copy  of  my  entire  letters  to  them. 

*  Upon  the  terms  of  this  letter,  which  was  written  in  answer  to  a  question 
whether  Mr.  Ruskin  sympathized  with  Lord  Beaconsticld  or  with  Mr.  Glad- 
stone, the  reader  is  referred  to  the  Epilogue.  The  bracketed  words  were 
omitted  in  the  Glasgow  Herald. 


EPILOGUE 


EPILOGUE. 


I  FIND  my  immitigable  Editor  insists  on  epilogue  as  well 
as  prologue  from  his  submissive  Author  ;  which  would  have 
fretted  me  a  little,  since  the  last  letter  of  the  series  appears  to 
me  a  very  })retty  and  comprehensive  sum  of  the  matters  in 
the  book,  liad  not  the  day  on  which,  as  Fors  would  have  it,  I 
am  to  write  its  last  line,  brought  to  my  mind  something  of 
importance  which  I  forgot  to  say  in  the  preface ;  nor  will  it 
perhaps  be  right  to  leave  wholly  without  explanation  the  short 
closing  letter  to  which  I  have  just  referred. 

It  should  be  observed  that  it  was  written  to  the  President 
of  the  Liberal  party  of  the  Glasgow  students,  in  answer  to  the 
question  which  I  felt  to  be  wholly  irrelevant  to  the  business 
in  hand,  and  which  could  not  have  been  answered  in  anything 
like  official  terms  with  anything  short  of  a  forenoon's  work.  I 
gave  the  answer,  therefore,  in  my  own  terms,  not  in  the  least 
petulant,  but  chosen  to  convey  as  much  information  as  I  could 
in  the  smallest  compass ;  and  carrying  it  accurately  faceted 
and  j^olished  on  the  angles. 

For  instance,  I  never,  under  any  conditions  of  provocation 
or  haste,  would  have  said  that  I  hated  Liberalism  as  I  did 
MamiiKyii^  or  Belial,  or  Moloch.  I  chose  the  milder  liend  of 
Ekron,  as  the  true  exponent  and  patron  of  Liberty,  the  God 
of  Flies ;  and  if  my  Editor,  in  final  kindness,  can  refer  the 
reader  to  the  comparison  of  the  Ilouse-tly  and  House-dog,  in 
(he,  and  not  I,  must  say  where)*  the  letter  will  have  received 
all  the  ilhistration  which  I  am  minded  to  give  it.  I  was  only 
surprised  that  after  its  publication,  of  course  never  intended, 

*  See  "The  Queen  of  the  Air,"  §§  148-152  (1874  Ed.). 


202  EPILOGUE. 

though  never  forbidden  by  me,  it  passed  with  so  little  chal- 
lenge,  and  was,  on  the  whole,  understood  as  it  was  meant. 

The  more  important  matter  I  have  to  note  in  closing,  is 
the  security  given  to  the  conclusions  arrived  at  in  many  sub-  I: 
jects  treated  of  in  these  letters,  in  consequence  of  the  breadth  i 
of  the  basis  on  which  the  reasoning  is  founded.     The  multi-  I 
plicity  of  subject,  and    opposite   directions   of   investigation,  J 
which  have  so  often  been  alleged  against  me,  as  if  sources  of  I 
weakness,  are  in  reality,  as  the  multiplied  buttresses  of  the  f 
apse  of  Amiens,  as  secure  in  allied  result  as  they  are  opposed 
in  direction.     Whatever  (for  instance)  I  have  urged  in  econ- 
omy has  ten  times  the  force  when  it  is  remembered  to  have 
been  pleaded  for  by  a  man  loving  the  splendor,  and  advising 
the  luxury  of  ages  which  overlaid  their  towers  w^th  gold,  and 
their  walls  with  ivory,     l^o  man,  often er  than  I,  has  had  cast 
in  his  teeth  the  favorite  adage  of  the  insolent  and  the  feeble — 
"  ne  sutor."    But  it  has  always  been  forgotten  by  the  speakers 
that,  although  the  proverb  might  on  some  occasions  be  wisely 
spoken  by  an  artist  to  a  cobbler,  it  could  never  be  wisely  spoken 
by  a  cobbler  to  an  artist. 

J.    RUSKIN. 

Amiens,  St.  Crispin's  Day,  1880. 


CHRONOLOGICAL  LIST   OF  THE  LETTERS 

Note. — In  the  second  and  third  columns  tJie-  bracketed  words  and  figures  are 


of  the  ■  ^ 


Title  of  Letter. 


A  Landslip  near  Giagnano     . 
Modern  Painters:  a  Reply     . 

Art  Criticism 

On  Reflections  in  Water 
Danger  to  the  National  Gallery 
The  Pre-RaAaelite  Brethren,  I. 
The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,  II. 
Letter  to  W.  C.  Bennett,  LL.D.    . 
The  National  Gallery  .... 
Letter  to  Dr.  Guthrie  .... 
Letter  to  W.  H.  Harrison 
"  The  Light  op^  the  World"  . 
"  The  AwAKENI^G  Conscience" 
"  Limner"  AND  Illumination  . 
The  Animals  of  Scripture  :  a  Review  . 
The  Turner  Bequest       .... 

On  the  Gentian 

The  Turner  Bequest  &  National  Gallery 

The  Castle  Rock  (Edinburgh) 

The  Arts  as  a  Branch  of  Education.    . 

Edinburgh  Castle 

The  Character  of  Turner     . 
Pre-Raphaelitism  in  Liverpool     . 
Generalization  &  Scotch  Pre-Raphaelites 
Gothic  Architecture  &  Oxford  Museum,  I. 
The  Turner  Sketches  and  Drawings    . 
Turner's  Sketch  Book  (extract)    . 
The  Liber  Studiorum  (extract)     . 
Gothic  Architecture  &  Oxford  Musuem,  II 
The  Sale  op  Mr.  Windus'  Pictures 
The  Italian  Question      .... 


The  Turne^  Gallery  at  Kensington   . 
Coventry  Patmore's  '  'Faithful  for  Ever" 
Mr.  Thornbury's  ' '  Life  of  Turner"  (extract) 
Art  Teaching  by  Correspondence 
On  the  Reflection  of  Rainbows    . 
Proverbs  on  Right  Dress 

Oak  Silkworms 

The  Depreciation  of  Gold 

The  Foreign  Policy  of  England   . 

The  Position  of  Denmark 

The  Law  op  Supply  and  Demand   . 


The  Conformation  of  the  Alps 
Concerning  Glaciers 
English  versus  Alpine  Geology 
Concerning  Hydrostatics 
Strikes  v.  Arbitration  . 
Work  and  Wages     . 


Naples  . 
'Denmark  Hill 
Deumark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill] 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Heme  Hill,  Dulw 
Heme  Hill,  Dulw 
[Edinbiirirh] 
[Heme  Hill  . 
Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill 
Dunbar 
Penrith 
Penrith 


ch 
ich 


Denmark  Hill 
Berlin    . 
Berlin    . 
Schaffhausen 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Lucerne 
Denmark  Hill 

] 


[. 


eneva. 
Geneva  . 
Chamounix . 
Zurich  . 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Norwich 
[Denmark  Hill] 
Denmark  Hill 


CONTAINED  IN  BOTH  VOLUMES. 

vwre  or  less  certainly  conjectured  ;  ichilst  those  unbracketed give  the  actual  dating 
letter. 


When  Written, 


February  7,  1841     . 
About  Sept.  17,  1843]      . 
Dec-cm  l)er.  18-48] 
Jjimiarv,  1844] 
January  6  [1847]      . 
Mav  9  [1801]   . 
3Iay  2()  [1801]. 
December  2m h.  lS,~)-3 
Dc'c-embiT2:  [18.")^'] 
Saturday. 2t)ili[Nov.V]18o3 

185;]]  . 
]\Iav  4  [1854]    . 
Mav24[1854]. 
Decembers,  1854]  . 
January.  1855] 
October  27  [1856]    . 
Februarv  10  [1857], 
July  8,  i857]  . 
14tli  September.  1857      . 
September  25,  1857 
27th  September  [1857]     , 

1857] 
January,  1858] 
March.  1858]  . 
June,  1858]      , 
November,  1858]     . 

1  1858     . 

J  1858     . 
January  20,  1859     . 
Marcli  28  [1859]       . 
June  6,  1859     , 
June  15  [1859] 
Autrust  1.  1859 
October  20  [1859]    . 
[October  21.  1800]   . 
December  2,  1801    . 
Noveml)er,  1860      , 
7th  Mav,  1861 . 
Octol)er  20ili.  1P63  . 
October  20th  [1862] 
October  2  [1863]      . 
October  25tli.  1863  . 
July  6  [1864]    . 
October  26  [1864]     . 
Oct()l)er29  [1864]    . 
November  2  [1864]  . 
10th  November.  1864      . 
November  21  [1864] 
29th  November  [1864]     . 
5th  December  [1864] 
Easter  Monday.  1865 
Thursday,ApriI20[1865] 


Where  and  when  first  Pi'bushed. 


;VoL.  AND 

Page. 


Proceedings  of  the  Ashmolean  Society    .  1.203 

The  M'eikli/  Chronicle,  Sept    23,  1843       .  I      i.3 

The  Artt\st  and  Aiudteur'n  Mafjdzinc,  18-14  '    i.lO 

7'he  Artist  and  Amateur's  Magazine,  1844  i  i.l91 

The  Times,  January  7,  1847      .         .         .  i.37 

The  Times,  May  13,  1851  .         .        .        .  !    i.59 

The  Times,  Mav  30,  1851 .         .         .         .  '    i.G3 

"Testimonials'of  W.  C.  Bennett,"  1871  ii.l83 

The  Time.H,  December  29,  1852          .         .  i    i.45 
"  Memoir  of  Thomas  Gut hrie.D.D.,"  (1875)11.184 

The  Autographic  Mirror,  T>iiQ.  2^,  IS^S^    .  ii.l92 

The  Times,  :Sliiy  15,  ISry-i  .         .         .         .  :    i.67 
The  Times,  ^,h{y  25,  ISo-i.         .         .         .1.71 

The  Builder,  Dl^c.  9,  1854:.        ,        .         .  ii.l74 

The  Morning  Chronicle,  Jan.  20,  1855       ,  ii.l72 

The  Times,  October  28,  1856     .         ,         .  1.81 

The  Athenmim,  February  14,  1857  .         .  1.204 

The  Times,  :iu\y  9.  185l\         ,         .         ,  1.86 

The  Witness  (Ediuburirh),  Sept.  16,  1857  1.145 

"  New  Oxford  Examinations,  etc.,"  1858  1.24 

The  mY//^«.v  (Edinburgh),  Sept.  30.  1857  1.147 

Thornbury's  Life  of  Turner.  Preface.  1861  1,107 

7 //^  Zm'r;}(96»^  ^^//?o;2,  January  11,  1858    .  1.73 

The  Witness  (Edinbiu-gh).  .March  27,  1858  1.74 

"The  Oxford  Museum."  1859  .         ,         .  1.125 

The  Literary  Gazette,  Nov.  13,  1858         .  1.88 

List  of  Turner's  Drawings,  Boston,  1874,  1.86 n. 

List  of  Turner's  Drawings,  Boston,  1874,  1.97  n. 

"The  Oxford  ^Fuseum,"  1859,         .         .  1.131 
The  Times,  March  29,  1859        .        .        .11.185 

The  Scotsman,  J u]y  20,  lS5d      .        .        ,  li.3 
July  23,  1859      .        ,        .11.8 

Aug.  6.  1859       ,        .        ,  11.13 

The  Times,  Octol)er  21,  1859     .         .        .  1.98 

r/^e  CV///^-,  Oct.  27,  1860    ,        .        ,        ,  ii.l68 

Thornbury's  Life  of  Turner.     Ed.  2,  Pref.  1.108 

Nature  and  Art,  December  1,  1866  .         .  1.33 

The  Lofidon  Ileview,  Mi\y  16,  ISQi    .        .  1.201 

The  Monthl)/ Packet,  Nov.  ISQ^         .        .  ii.l54 

The  Times,  Oc[.  24,  ISm  .        .        .        .  ii.l58 

The  Times,  Oct.  8,  1863     ,        ,        .        .  j  li.37 

Th'eLii-crpool  Albion,  Nov.  2,  1S63    .        .  ;  li.15 

The  Morning  Post,  J yi]y  7,  liiQ4:         .        ,  I  ii.l7 

T lie  Daily  Telegraph,  Oct,  28,  1864  .        .  ;  ii.39 

Oct.  31.  1864  .        .  11,40 

Nov.  3.  1864  .        .  I  li.43 

r^e  iZ^arf^r,  November  12,  1864      .        .  i.l73 

The  P£ader,  November  26,  1864      .         .  1.175 
r//«  i?^af/^;-,  December  3.  1864          ,         ,1.181 

The  Reader,  DacamhQV  10,  U8\       .         .  i  1.185 

The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  April  18,  1865        .  '  11.48 

April  21,  1865         .  ii.50 


206 


CHRONOLOGICAL   LIST   OF  I'HE   LETTERS 


Title  of  Letter. 


Work  and  Wages 


Domestic  Servants— Mastershtp 
"  "  Experience 

"  "  SoNSHiP  AND  Slavery 

^Modern  Houses 

Our  Raiuway  System 

The  Jamaica  Insurrection 

The  British  Museum 

Copies  of  Turner's  Drawings  (extract) 

At  the  Play      .... 

The  Standard  of  Wages 

An  Object  of  Charity     . 

True  Education 

Excuse  from  Correspondence 

Is  England  Big  Enough?  . 

The  Ownership  of  Railways  . 

Railway  Economy     . 

Employment  for  the  Destitute  Poor,  etc. 

Notes  on  the  Destitute  Classes,  etc. 

The  jMorality  of  Field  Sports 

Female  Franchise    . 

The  Franco-Prussian  War     . 


Sad-Colored  Costumes    . 

Railway  Safety 

A  King's  First  Duty 

Kotre  Dame  de  Paris 

A  Nation's  Defences 

"Turners"  False  and  True    . 

The  Waters  of  Comfort 

The  Streams  of  Italy 

Woman's  Sphere  (extract) 

The  "  Queen  of  the  Air" 

Drunkenness  and  Crime  . 

Castles  and  Kennels 

Verona  v.  Warwick  . 

Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence:  a  Defence 

Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence  :  a  Rejoinder 

John  Leech's  Outlines    . 

The  Streets  of  London   . 

Madness  and  Crime  .... 

Letter  to  the  Author  op  a  Review 

'  •  Act,  Act  in  the  Living  Present" 

How  the  Rich  spend  their  Money 


Woman's  Work 

Mr.  Ruskin  and  Professor  Hodgson 


"  Laborare  est  Orare"   . 

Ernest  George's  Etchings 

James  David  Forbes:  his  Real  Greatness 


Where  Written. 


Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill] 
Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill] 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Dennjark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 


L 


S.E. 


S.E. 


enmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill, 
Denmark  Hill, 
Denmark  Hill, 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill, 
[Denmark  Hil 
Denmark  Hill 
Venice  . 
Denmark  Plill, 
[Denmark  Hill,  S.E.] 
Denmark  Hill,  S.E. 
Denmark  Hill 
[Denmark  Hill]    . 
[Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Oxford . 
Oxford . 
[Oxford 

[Denmark  Hill]  . 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 
Denmark  Hill 


S.E. 


fi 


Denmark  Hill]    . 
Oxford  . 
Oxford  . 
Oxford  . 

Brantwood,  Coniston 
[Brantwood,  Coniston] 
Brantwood.  Coniston 


Oxford  . 
Oxford  . 
Oxford  . 
[Denmark  Hill 


CONTAINED  IN  BOTH  VOLUMES. 


207 


When  Written. 


Saturday.  April  22.  1865  . 
-   Miiclav.  29tli  April,  1865 

V  4  nSG.")]  . 
May  20.  18Go  . 
September  2  [18651. 
September  6  [18()5]. 
September  16.  1865] 
October  16  [1865]  . 
December  7  [1865 1  . 
December  19  [1865] 
Jan.  26  [1866] . 

]  1867     . 
February  28.  1867    . 
April  30*;  1867  . 
January  21,  1868      . 
January  31,  1868      . 
2(1  Febi-uarv.  1868  . 
July  30  [1868] . 
Aui^ust  5  [1868 
Aui]:u.st  9  [1868 
l).rember24  [1868] 
Auiumu.  1868] 
January  14  [1870]    . 
291  h  Miiy.  1870 
October'6  [1870]      . 
October  7  [1870J      . 
14tli  October.  1870  . 
November  29.  1870  . 
January  10  [1871]    . 
January  18,  1871]    . 
January  19.  1871      . 
January  23  [1871]    . 
February  3  [1871]    . 
February  3  [1871]    . 
February  19,  1871]  . 
May  18.  1871    . 
December  9  [1871]  . 
December  20  [1871] 
24lli  (for  25tli)  Dec.  [1871] 
March  15  [1872~ 
March  21  [1872 

1872 
December  27.  1'871 
November  2  [1872]  . 


Christmas  E^'e.  ' » 
January  23  [1873 
January  28  [1873 
King  Charles  the  Martv 

^1873  . 
[May,  1873] 
November  8,  1873   . 
November  15.  1873. 
December,  1873 
December,  1873]     . 
1874J       . 


Whkrk  and  when  first  Published. 


ThePaUMcEU  Gazette,  April  25.  1865 
May  2.  1865    . 
May  9.  Ib65    . 
ISIay  22.  1H65  . 
The  Daily  Telegraph,  September  5,  1865  , 
September  7,  1865 
September  18,  186.' 
October  17,  1865 
December  8.  1865 
December  20,  1665 
The  Tim€.<<,  January  27.  1866    . 
iList  of  Turner's  Drawings,  Boston,  1874 
T?ie  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  March  1,  1867 
May  1,  1867    . 
TJie  Daily  Teleqraph,  January  22,  1868 
The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  January  31.  1868 
Circular  printed  by  Mr.  Uuskin.  1868 
The  Daily  Telegraph,  July  31,  1868  . 
Auffust  6,  1868 
August  10,  1868 
December  26,  1868 
Pamphlet  for  private  circulation.  1868 
The  Daily  Telegraph,  January  15,  1870 
Date  and  place  of  publication  unknown 
The  Daily  Telegraph,  Oct.  7,  1870    . 
Oct.  8.  1870    . 
Macmillan's  Magazine,  l^ov.  1870 
The  Daily  Telegraph,  Nov.  30,  1870  . 

January  12,  1871 
January  19.  1871 
The  Pall  MaU  Gazette,  Jan.  19,  1871 
The  Times,  January  24,  1871    . 
The  Daily  Teh  graph,  Feb.  4,  1871    . 
Feb.  7.  1871    . 
Feb.  21,  1871  . 
The  Asiatic,  May  23.  1871 
The  Daily  Telegraph,  Dec.  11.  1871  . 

December  22.  1871 
December  25.1871 
The  Pall  MaU  Gazette,  ]\Iarch  16.  1872 
March  21,  1872 
The  Catalogue  to  the  Exhibition.  1872 
Tlie  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  Dec.  28.  1871 
Nov.  4.  1872  . 


Wednesday,  Oct.  30  [1872]  Liverpool  Weekly  Albion,  Nov.  9,  1872 


New  Year's  Address,  etc.,  1873 
The  Pall  MaU  Gazette,  Jan.  24,  1873 
Jan.  29.  1873. 

Jan.  31.  1873. 
L'Esperance,  Geneve,  May  8,  1873 
The  Scotsman,  November  10.  1873  . 
November  18,  1873  . 
New  Year's  Address,  etc.,  1874  . 
The  Arrhit.ct,  December  27,  1873  . 
"  Reudu's Glaciers  of  Savoy,"  1874. 


Vol.  and 
Paoe. 


ii.53 
ii.54 
ii.59 
ii.62 
ii.93 
ii.95 

ii.ye 

ii.l04 

ii.88 

ii.20 

i.52 

i.l05/j. 
;ii.lS5 
I  ii.65 
,ii.l86 
jii.123 
ii.l86 

ii.79 

ii.81 

ii.83 
ii.l31 
ii.l32 
ii.l27 
ii.l54 

ii.22 

ii.25 
ii.l56 

ii.89 
ii.lU 

i.l53 
ii.ll3 

i.l06 
ii.ll5 
ii.ll6 
ii.l54;j. 
ii.l71 
ii.l29 

i.l51 

i.l52 

i.l54 

i.l56 
'  i.lll 
ii.ll9 
ii.i:'.0 
ii.l87 
ii.l41 
!  ii.66 
I  ii.67 

i  ii.68 
ii.l53 
1  ii.44 
'  ii.46 
ii.l42 
I  1.113 
1  1.187 


208 


CHROXOLOGICAL    LIST   OF   THE   LETTERS 


TiTLK  OF  Letter, 


The  Value  of  Lectures  . 

An  Oxfokd  Protest  . 

A  Mistaken  Review  . 

The  Position  of  Critics  .    '    . 

Commercial  Morality 

The  Publication  of  Books 

St.  George's  Museum 

The  Definition  of  Wealth    . 

The  Fredkrick  Walker  Exhibition 

The  Cradle  of  Art! 

Modern  Warfare 

Copies  of  Turner's  Drawings 

Turner's  Drawings,  I. 

Turner's  Drawings,  II.    . 

The  Foundations  of  Chivalry 


IMoDERN  Restoration 

RtBBESFORD  ChURCH 

Mr  Ruskin  and  Mr.  Lowe 

The  Principles  of  Property  . 

A  Pagan  Message 

Despair  (k  tract)      .        .        .        , 

The  Foundations  of  Chivalry 

KoTES  ON  A  Word  in  Shakespeare 

The  BrBLioGRAPiiY  of  Ruskin  . 

The  Society  op  the  Rose 

Blindness  and  Sight 

"  The  Eagle's  Nest" 

On  Cooperation.    I. 

Politics  in  Youth     ... 

St.  Mark's,  Venice — Circular  relating  to 

St.  Mark's,  Venice — Letters  . 

On  the  Purchase  of  Pictures 

The  Merchant  of  Venice  (extract) 

Recitations 

Excuse  from  Correspondence 
Copy  of  Turner's  "Fluelen" 
The  Study  of  Natural  History 
On  Cooperation.     II. 
The  Glasgow  Lord  Rectorship 


Dramatic  Reform.     I. 

The  Glasgow  Lord  Rectorship 

Dramatic  Reform.     II.    . 


Where  Written. 


Rome    . 

[Oxford 
Brantwood 
Brant  wood 
[Heme  Hill 
Oxford  . 
Brantwood, 
Oxford  . 


Coniston 


Oxford] 
^Brantwood] 

Peterborough 
Brantwood  . 
Brantwood,  Coniston, 

Lancashire 
Venice  . 
Venice  . 
Venice  . 
Venice  . 
Venice  . 
Brantwood,  Coniston, 

Lancashire 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
[Brantwood] 
Heme  Hill,  London, S.E 
[Oxford 
Mai  ham 
Brantwood    . 
Edinburgh    . 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
[Brantwood  . 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
Sheffield 

Brantwood  . 

Brantwood  . 

Brantwood  . 

Heme  Hill,  S.E.] 
Sheffield 

tB  rant  wood] 
iondon 

Brantwood,  Coniston 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
[Brantwood] 
[Brantwood] 
Brantwood,  Coniston 
Brantwood     . 
Rouen    . 
Amiens . 


COKTAINED   IN   BOTH   VOLUMES. 


2oy 


When  Written. 


Where  and  when  first  Published. 


174]  : 

sir}}   . 


26th  Aiay.  1874 
October  29,  ]S: 
January  10  [18'; 
JanuMrv  18  [181 
February.  1875] 
June  6.  1875     . 
[September.  1875]    . 
9tli  2S()veniher,  1875 
January.  1876] 
18th  February,  1876 
June.  lb7G     *  . 
April  23  [1876] 
July  a  [1876]  . 
July  16  [1876] 

February  8th.  1877. 
February  lUth  [1877 
11th  February  [1877 
12th  February,  77] 
15th  April.  1877 
I  July  24,  1877  . 

j  August  24  [1877] 
i  lOtii  October,  1877 
i  19th  December,  1877 
'  February,  1878] 

July  3d.' 1878  . 
'  [September,  1878] 
I  29th  Septeml)er.  1878 
.'  September  30.  1878 
i.  Octol)er  23.  1878 
;  Early  in  1879]  . 
'  IStli'july.  1879 

Aujiust  i7th.  1879 
'  [Auiiust.  1879] 
i  October  19th,  1879 
(  Winter  1879]. 
1:  Winter  1879]   . 
:  January.  1880] 

6ih  February,  1880 

lOtli  February,  1880 

:March,  1880]'  . 

'JOth  March,  1880, 

Undated  . 

Al^ril  12th.  1880 

KMh  June,  1880 

KJtli  June.  1880 

24th  June.  1880 

[July,  1880]      . 

July  30tb,  1880 
•  28th  September,  1880 
I  October  12th,  1880  . 


The  Glasgow  fferald,  June  5,  1874    . 
The  Globe,  Oct.  29,  1874    . 
The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  January  11,  1875 
January  19.  1875 
Date  and  place  of  publication  unknown 
The  World.  June  9.  1875    . 
Sheffield  J),  (ill/  Tit  graph.  Sept.  6,  1875 
The  Mo)u'tary  Gazette,  Nov.  13,  1875 
77/<'  liinei*,  January  20.  1876    . 
Date  and  i)lace  of  publication  unknown 
\Fraxer's  Magazine,  July,  1876    . 
77/t' 7Yw/'.\ 'April  25.  1876 
llie  Daily  IVieqraph,  July  5.  1876    . 
I  "  "  Julfl9,  1876. 

I  "The  Science  of  Life"  (second  edit.).  1878 

1  "  "  (first  edition),  1877 

j  *'  "  "  "  1877 

I  «.  «  .,  ..  jg77 

The  Liverpool  Daily  Post,  June  9,  1877 
The  Kidderminster  Times,  July  28,  1877 

\T?ie  Standard,  August  28,  1877 
^The  Social ifst,  November,  1877  . 
New  Year's  Address,  etc..  1878 
^Tlie  Times,  February  12,  1878  . 
"  The  Science  of  Life"  (second  edit.),  1878 
New  Shakspere  Soc.  Trans.  1878-9  . 

"Bibliography  of  Dickens"  (advt.),  1880 

Report  of  Ruskin  Soc,  Manchester,  1880 
.The  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,  Sept.,  1879 
I  "  "  October,  1879 

\The  Christian  Life,  December  20,  1879 
\The  7.  M.  A.  Magazine,  Nov.,  1879 
See  the  Circular  .... 
Birmingham  Daily  Mail,  Nov.  27.  1879 
Leicester  Chronicle,  January  31,  1880 
The  Theatre,  .Alarch,  1880 
Circular  printed  bj'  Mr.  R.  T.  Webling 
List  of  Mr.  Ruskin's  Writings.  ]Mar.,  1880 
Lithograph  copy  issued  by  Mr.  Ward,  1880 
Leitcr  to  Adam  White  [unknown]. 
The  Daily  Neirs,  June  19,  1880 
The  Glasgow  Herald,  Oct.  7.  1880     . 

Oct.  7,  1880       . 

Oct.  7,  1880       . 

Oct.  12, 1880     . 
Jovrnal  of  Dramatic  Reform,  Nov.,  1880 
The  Glasgow  Herald,  Oct.  7,  1880     . 
\  Journal  of  Dramatic  Beform,  Nov.,  1880 


Vol.  and 
Page. 


ii.l24 

ii.l88 
.ii.l65 
ii.l67 

ii.70 
ii.l63 
li  126 

ii.71 

i.ll6 
ii.l25 

ii.29 

i.l05 
i.lOO 

i.l04 

ii.l43 
ii.l45 
ii.l46 
ii.l47 

i.l57 

1.158 

11.189 
li.71 

11.143 

il.l24?;. 

ii.l48 

11.176 
ii.177 
:il.l90 
'ii.l90 

ii.l91 

ii.l39 
|il.l40 
I  ii.73 
|ii.l41 
I  1.159 
t  1.169 

I  1.55 
11.179 
11.180 
11.186;^ 

I  i.l05/j. 

1.204 
!  11.73 
11.195 
li.l95 
11.196 
11.196 

II  193 
11.197 
11.193 


« 


INDEX 


INDEX. 


Abana  and  Pharpar,  ii.  10. 

Academy-studies,  i.  119;  usual  tendencies  of  academies,  i.  73;  the  Liver- 
pool, ib.\  Royal  Academy,  pictures  seen  to  disadvantage  in  the,  i.  20; 
Exhibitions  of  the.  i.  59,  67, 176  (not2),  119  (note);  the  Scotch  Academy, 
i.  74  (note),  176  (note). 

Acland,  Sir  Thomas,  i.  25. 

(Dr.).  Henry,  1.  25;  i.  125  (note);  i.  130;  i.  170.     (See  also  Oxford 

JMuseum.) 

Advertisement  of  books,  ii.  164. 

^schylus,  his  work,  i.  22  (note). 

Agassiz  and  Forbes,  i.  176;  i.  187. 

Age,  the  present,  one  of  "steam  and  iron,  luxury  and  selfishness,"  i.  18;  one 
in  which  poetry  is  disregarded,  i.  18;  fever  of  change  in,  ii.  101;  shal- 
low learning,  the  curse  of,  ii.  124, 

Agreements,  compulsory,  li.  53. 

Ailsa  Rock,  i.  146. 

Alisma  Plantago,  i.  61. 

Allen,  Mr.  George,  i.  163;  i.  169  (note). 

Alms  and  Wages,  ii.  56;  ii.  60. 

Almsgiving,  ii.  101.     (See  Charity.) 

Alps,  conformation  of  the,  i.  173,  seqq.;  origin  of  form  of,  i.  174;  charts  of 
sections  of  chain  wanted,  i.  175;  extent  of  chain,  i.  182;  Mr.  Ruskin's 
lecture  on  the  Savoy  Alps,  i.  174,  and  note. 

Alsace  and  Lorraine,  ii.  28. 

Alsen,  ii.  18,  and  note. 

Amazon,  Kiss',  ii.  13  (note),  12. 

Ambition,  tone  of  modern,  ii.  144,  146. 

America,  Enghmd  no  need  to  Icnrn  from,ii.  73;  has  nocastles,  1.151  (note); 
reference  to  Mr.  Ruskin  by  Mr.  Ilolyoake  in,  ii.  73;  serf  economy  in, 
ii.  21. 

American  War,  loss  of  property  in,  ii.  38.     (Sec  aho  Lincoln,  Pres.) 

Amiens,  Cathedral  of,  i.  154,  ii.  202;  the  theatres  at,  ii.  193. 

Andrew,  St.,  ii.  8. 

Angelico,  i.  43,  i.  118;  and  Giotto,  their  theology  of  death,  i.  118;  holiness 
of,  ii.  23  (note);  his  "highest  inspiration"  destroyed  at  Florence,  i.  38, 
and  note;  his  "Last  Judgment,"  i.  44,  and  note;  formerly  no  picture 
by  in  National  Gallery,  i.  43,  and  note. 


214  IKDEX. 

Angrogna,  the  valley  of,  ii.  11. 

Animals,  kindness  and  cruelty  to,  ii.  128  seqq.;  128  (note);  ii.  142;  portrait- 
ure of  in  architecture,  i.  141;  of  Scripture,  ii.  172. 

Anjou,  ii.  28. 

Annual  Register  (1859)  quoted,  ii.  10  (note). 

Antwerp,  "Rubens"  at,  i.  39. 

"  A  Pagan  Message,"  ii.  143. 

Apolline  Myths,  the,  ii.  172. 

Apollo  Belvedere,  tiie,  i.  7. 

Appendix,  List  of  Letters  in  the,  ii.  181.      • 

Arabian  Nights,  the,  quoted,  "the  seals  of  Solomon,"  (Story  of  the  Fisher- 
man, Chapter  ii.),  i.  136;  Story  of  the  Ugly  Bridegroom,  ii.  101. 

Arbia,  the,  ii.  15  (note). 

Arbitration  and  Strikes  (letter),  ii.  48. 

Archer  knight,  the,  i.  158. 

Architect,  The,  (Dec.  27,  1873,)  Letter  on  E.  George's  Etchings,  i.  113. 

Architecture,  List  of  Letters  on,  i.  123;  its  beauty  dependent  on  its  use,  i. 
148;  Byzantine  builders,  i.  167;  cultivation  of  feeling  for  drawing  in, 
i.  114;  English  copying  of  old,  i.  141;  expressional  character  of,  i.  157; 
Frankenstein  monsters,  i.  156;  Gothic  and  Classic,  i.  99  (note);  Gothic, 
and  the  Oxford  Museum  (letters),  i.  125  seqq.,  131  seqq.;  Greek  work 
freehand,  i.  168;  jobbery  in  modern,  i.  158;  pseudo- Venetian,  i.  157; 
sculpture,  use  of,  in,  i.  139.9^5-5-. ;  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  place  of,  in,  i.  161: 
Ruskin's  influence  on  modern,  i.  154-157;  unity  in,  i.  140.  (See  also 
Gothic  Architecture.) 

Areola,  ii.  33. 

Argument,  the  best  kind  of,  i.  37. 

Aristotle,  his  work,  i.  22  (note). 

Arno,  the,  ii.  116-118. 

Art,  the  alphabet  of  (Dr.  Acland  on),  i.  130;  @olor  and  design,  1.  29;  connec- 
tion of  with  other  studies,  i.  28,  31;  conventionalism  in,  i.  142;  danc- 
ing, ii.  148;  dicta  in,  dangerous,  i.  24,  28;  drawing — practical  value  of, 
i.  28;  an  essential  part  of  education,  i.  26;  its  uses,  ih. ;  a  more  univer- 
sal faculty  than  music,  ib.\ — education  in  art,  i.  30;  enjoyment  of  dif- 
ferent kinds  of  art  by  different  people,  i.  14,  i.  27;  generalization  in 
art,  i.  75;  Greek  art,  study  of,  ii.  148;  growth  of  art  in  England  and 
Italy,  i.  9;  happiness  and  knowledge  of  art,  i.  25;  highest  art  the  most 
truthful,  i.  140:  history  of,  i.  27;  how  far  to  be  studied,  i.  29;  "ideas" 
in,  ii.  17;  inclusive  of  what,  i.  30;  should  be  public,  permanent,  and 
expressive,  i.  127,  54;  manufacture  and,  i.  29,  ii.  138;  music,  ii.  148; 
ornnmental  art,  i.  142;  special  gift  for,  how  to  detect,  i.  29;  studies,  how 
to  direct,  i.  27;  teaching  by  correspondence,  i.  32;  unity  of  purpose  in, 
i.  140;  use  of  before  printing,  i.  125  (note). 

Art  Criticism,  List  of  Letters  on,  i.  2;  letter,  "Art  Criticism,"  i.  10  seqq.; 
art  criticism,  impossible  to  very  young  men,  and  why,  i.  27;  neces- 
sarily partial,  and  why,  i.  27;  the  common  dicta  of,  their  dangerous 


INDEX.  215 

use,  i.  24,  26;  how  to  develop  the  power  of,  ib. ;  the  foundations  of,  i. 
27;  the  kinds  of,  right  and  wrong,  ib. 

Art-critics,  i.  12;  two  kinds  of,  i.  10;  quahfications  of,  i.  10  (note). 

Art  Education,  List  of  Letters  on,  i.  2;  danger  of  too  good  models,  i.  28. 
(See  Art.) 

Art  Examinations,  range  and  object  of,  i.  25;  examples  of  questions  to  be 
set  in,  i.  25. 

Artist  (see  Art),  two  courses  open  to  the,  i.  18;  extent  of  his  work,  i.  26; 
igjiorance  of  landscape  in  portrait  painters,  i.  15,  and  note;  letters  on 
artists  and  pictures,  i.  Ill  segq. 

Artist  and  Amateur's  Magazine,  Letter  on  Art  Criticism  in  (January  1844), 
i.  10  segq. ;  allusion  to  article  in.  i.  18,  and  note;  Letter  to  Editor  on 
"Reflections  in  Water"  (February  1844),  i.  101  seqq.;  review  of  "Mod- 
ern Painters,"  in,  i.  200  (note). 

Art  Journal,  "  Cestus  of  Aghua"  referred  to,  ii.  99,  and  note;  Letters  on 
"  A  Museum  or  Picture  Gallery"  mentioned,  i.  xvii.  and  note. 

Arts,  Society  of.     (See  Societies.) 

Art  Union,  on  "  Modern  Painters,"  i.  191;  writers  for  the,  i.  15. 

Arve,  foul  water  of  the,  i.  195. 

Arveron,  the,  i.  179. 

Ashmolcan  Society,  Proceedings  of  (1841),  Letter  on  "A  Landslip  near 
Giagnauo"  in,  i.  202. 

Asuitic,  The,  (May  23,  1871,)  Letter,  "  The  Queen  of  the  Air,"  ii.  171. 

Astraean  anecdote,  an,  ii.  180. 

Athena,  i.  162,  165  (note);  the  Queen  of  the  Air,  ii.  171. 

AthencEum,  The,  (February  14,  1857,)  Letter  on  the  Gentian,  i.  204;  the 
Glasgow  Athenaeum,  ii.  124  (note). 

Athens,  ii.  178. 

Atmospheric  pressure,  i.  185  scgg. 

Atreus'  treasury  and  St.  Mark's,  i.  162. 

Audiences,  modern,  ii.  124;  ii.  179. 

Aurifrigium,  ii.  178. 

Authorsliip,  early  in  life,  deprecated,  ii.  164;  needs  training,  ib. 

Austerlitz,  battle  of,  ii.  30. 

Austin's  definition  of  Justice,  ii.  57  (note). 

Australia,  gold  in,  ii.  56  (note). 

Austria,  characteristics  of  the  nation,  ii.  5  segg.;  "barbarism,"  and  mag- 
nanimity of,  ii.  6;  and  France,  loss  in  war  between,  ii.  33;  work  of,  in 
Italy,  ii.  6  segg. 

Autographic  Mirror,  The  (Dec.  23, 18G5),  letter  to  ^\.  II.  Harrison  in,  ii.  192. 

Auvergne,  ii.  28. 

Autoun's  "  Ballads  of  Scotland"  referred  to,  i.  76  (note). 

Babies,  ii.  183;  "  Baby  May, "  i6.  (note). 

Backhuyscn,  i.  12. 

Bacon,  his  mission  and  work,  i.  22  (note). 


21 G  IKDEX. 

Ballade,  Scotch,  i.  76  (note);  "Burd  Helen,"  i5. 

Bandiuelli,  i.  43. 

Bauk  directors,  ii.  131. 

Bargaining  and  begging,  ii.  56. 

Barometer,  use  of  the,  i,  185. 

Barry,  Sir  C,  ii.  175  (note);  James,  R  A.,  anecdote  of,  i.  15,  16,  and  note. 

Bartholomew  Fair,  1.  55. 

Bartolomeo,  Fra,  no  picture  by  in  the  National  Gallery,  i.  44,  and  note. 

Bass,  Mr.  M.  T.,  ii.  18  (note). 

Bass-rock,  The,  i.  145. 

Beaconstield,  Lord,  and  Mr.  Gladstone,  ii.  197. 

Beaumont,  Sir  G.,  i.  7  (note). 

Bee,  the  Queen,  ii.  103. 

Beelzebub,  ii.  197. 

Bogging  and  Bargaining,  ii.  56. 

Bellini,  i.  43,  47,  165  (note);  his  "Doge  Leonardo  Loredano, "  45,  46,  and 

note;  character  of  as  an  artist,  ib. 
Bellinzona,  the  people  of,  ii.  117;  Mr.  Ruskin  at,  ib. 
Bennett,  AV.  C,  Letter  to,  ii.  183;  his  Poems,  ib.,  and  note. 
Bentham's  definition  of  justice,  ii.  56. 
Ben  Wyvis,  i.  146. 
Berlin,  Mr.  Ruskin's  letters  from,  ii.  3,  8;  the  sights  of,  ii.  12  and  12 (note); 

Sundays  at,  ii.  11. 
Bible,  animals  of  the,  ii.  172  seqq.;  possible  errors  in  the,  ii.  98,  and  note; 

■what  to  read  in  the,  ii.  142;  quoted  or  referred  to,— 

"What  are  these  wounds  in  thy  hands"  (Znchariah  xiii.  6),  i.  60  (note). 

"I  meditate  on  all  thy  works"  (Psalm  cxliii.  5),  i.  61  (note). 

"Behold,  I  stand  at  the  door  and  knock"  (Revelation  iii.  20),  1.  68. 

The  wild  grass  "whereof  the  mower  filleth  not  his  hand"  (Psalm  cxxix.  7),  i,  68. 

(See  both  Bible  and  Prayer-book  versions.) 
"  The  feet  of  those  who  publish  peace"  (Isaiah  111.  7),  i.  133. 
"  We  also  are  his  offspring"  (Acts  xvii.  28),  i.  162. 
"  Abana  and  Pharpar"  (2  Kings  v.  12),  ii.  10. 

"  Woe  unto  thee,  O  land,  when  thy  king  is  a  child"  (Ecclesiastes  x.  16),  ii.  21. 
"Raising  the  poor"  (1  Sam.  ii.  8;  Psalm  cxiii.  7),  ii.  27. 
"The  commandment  is  holy,  just,  and  good  "  (Romans  vii.  12),  ii.  55. 
"Who  sweareth  to  his  own  hurt,  and  changeth  not"  (Psalm  xv.  4).  ii.  57. 
"  Eye  for  eye,  and  tooth  for  tooth"  (Exodus  xxi.  24.  and  reff.),  ii.  63. 
"He  that  delicately  bringeth  up  his  servant,"  etc.  (Proverbs  xxix.  21),  ii.  93. 
"  Not  now  as  a  servant,  but  above  a  servant,  a  brother  beloved"  (Philemon  16), 

ii.  98. 
"The  waters  of  comfort"  (Psalm  xxiii.  5,  Prayer-book  version),  ii.  115. 
"  Eyes  have  they,  and  see  not"  (.Jeremiah  v.  21),  ii.  140. 
"A  rod  for  tlie  fool's  back"  (Proverbs  xxvi.  3),  ii.  141. 

"  A  rod  is  for  the  back  of  him  that  is  void  of  understanding"  (Proverbs  x.  13),  ib. 
"Thou  Shalt  not  commit  adultery"  (Exodus  xx.  14),  ii.  147. 
"  Male  and  female  created  he  them"  (Genesis  i.  27).  ii.  148. 
"  I  will  make  a  helpmeet  for  him"  (Genesis  ii.  18),  ib. 

"All  her  household  are  clothed  with  scarlet"  (Proverbs  xxxi.  21,  22),  ii.  155. 
"  Who  clothed  you  in  scarlet"  (2  Samuel  i.  24),  ib. 


I 


INDEX.  21? 

"  The  king's  daughter  is  all  glorious  within"  (Psalm  xiv.  13.  14),  ii.  155. 

"  She  riseth  while  it  is  yet  night.  .  .  .  Strength  and  honor  are  her   clothing* 

(Proverbs  xxxi.  15,  xxii.  5),  ii.  157. 
"And  the  city  was  broken  up"  ci  King^s  xxv.  4),  ii.  177. 

Bigg,  Mr.  "W.  M.,  sale  of  pictures,  i.  102  (note). 

Bills,  for  fresh  railways,  ii.  88:  the  reform  bill  (1867),  ii.  133. 

Birds,  preservation  of  wild,  ii.  128  (note);  treatment  of,  ii.  142. 

Birmingham  Daily  Mail,  Nov.  27,  1879  (Mr.  Ruskiu  on  St.  Mark's,  Venice), 

i.  170. 
Bishops,  ii.  131. 

Black,  W.,  "  The  Daughter  of  Heth,"  i.  120  (note). 
Black-letter,  not  illegible,  ii.  (note),  174,  175. 
Blackfriars  Bible  Class.     See  "  New  Year's  Address." 
Blackstone's  summary  of  law,  ii.  63,  and  note, 
B'uckirood's  Magazine,  the  art  critic  of,  i.  13. 
"Blind  Fiddler,"  the,  i.  7. 
Bluecoat  School,  i.  55. 
Boat-race,  training  for,  ii.  145. 
Boileau  quoted,  i.  14. 
"  Bold"  work  in  drawing  and  music,  i.  95. 
Bonheur,  Mdlle.  Rosa,  escape  of,  from  Paris,  ii.  23  (note). 
Books,  publication  of,  ii.  163;  number  of  in  the  world,  ii.  164. 
Booth,  J.  "Wilkes  (assassin  of  President  Lincoln),  ii.  54  (note). 
Botany,  an  examination  paper  in,  i.  32.     (See  also  Flowers.) 
Bouguer,  Pierre,  i.  196  (note). 
Bourges  Cathedral,  i.  154. 

Bragge,  Mr.  W.  and  the  Sheffield  Museum,  ii.  126  (note). 
"  Break,"  meaning  of,  ii.  177. 
Br^che,  the,  ii,  28. 
Brenta,  the,  ii.  10,  117. 
Brewster,  SirD.,  i.  196. 

Bridgewater  House,  "Turner"  at,  i.  11,  and  note. 
Bright,  Mr.  John,  M.P.,  ii.  \%^  »eqq. 
Brighton,  railway  competition  at,  ii.  83  (note). 
British  Museum,  Letter  on,  i.  52  seqq. ;  i.  102,  103;  catalogues  of  the,  i.  53; 

Henry  VL's  psalter  at,  i.  54,  and  note;  preservation  of  drawings  at,  i. 

84;  what  it  is  and  is  not,  i.  53,  54. 
Brodie,  Prof.,  at  Oxford,  i.  134,  and  note. 
Bromley,  villas  at,  i.  156. 
Brooke,  Stopford  A.,  ii.  156,  and  note. 
Browne,  Edward,  Dr.,  ii.  120.  and  note;  Thomas,  Sir,  ib. 
Browning,  Robert,  ii.  183  (note). 
Bubastis,  cats  sacred  to  (Herodotus,  ii.  67),  ii.  19. 
Buchan*^  Scotch  Ballads  referred  to,  i.  76  (note). 
Biickland.  Dr.  William,  i.  182  (note) 
Builder,  The  (Dec.  9,  1854),  Letter,  "  Limner"  and  Illumination,  ii.  174 


218  IKDEX. 

Buildings,  modern,  ii.  147,  i.  156;  repair  of,  ii.  203. 

Bunch,  Sydne}'^  Smith's,  ii.  96,  and  note. 

Bunney,  Mr.,  painting  of  St.  Mark's,  i.  169  (note). 

Buonaroti,  i,  43. 

"  Burd  Helen,"  i.  76,  and  note;  meaning  of  "  Burd,"  ib. 

Burgundy,  ii.  28. 

Burial  and  immortality,  i.  141. 

Burlington  House,  i.  118. 

Burne  Jones,  Mr.,  and  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  170. 

Burns,  quoted,  i.  19,  and  note. 

Butler,  Bishop,  ii.  56. 

Byron  quoted,  i.  19,  and  note,  i.  20;  Turner's  illustrations  of,  i.  102  (note). 

Cabmen's  fares,  ii.  53. 

Calcutta,  ii.  33. 

California,  gold  in,  ii.  37  (note). 

Callcott,  Sir  A.,  i.  14,  31,  23. 

Campanile,  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  167;  at  Verona,  i.  169. 

Campbell  quoted,  i.  20  (note),  31. 

Canterbury  Cathedral,  i.  161. 

Cape  of  Good  Hope  and  Venetian  History,  ii.  145. 

Capital,  employment  of,  ii.  85  seqq.)  sunk  in  works  of  art,  ii.  86. 

Capital  Punishment,  ii.  134. 

Cappel,  ii.  4  (note),  5. 

Capri,  grotto  of,  i.  200  (note). 

"Captain,"  loss  of  the,  ii.  37,  and  note. 

Caracci  and  Titian,  i.  51. 

Careers,  modern,  ii.  144,145,  146. 

Carl3ie,  Thomas,  quoted,  his  "Frederick  the  Great,"  ii.  37;  on  the  Jamaica 

Insurrection  and  the  Eyre  Defence  Fund,  ii.  20  (note),   33  (note);  on 

servants,  ii.  101;  letter  to  W.  C.  Bennett,  ii.  267  (note). 
Carpenter,  W.  H.,  i.  84,  and  note,  93. 
Carriage  of  heavy  goods,  ii.  136,  138. 

Gary's  Dante  quoted,  ii.  15  (note);  criticised,  174,  and  note. 
Casentino,  ii.  118. 
Castel  a-mare,  landslip  near,  i.  303. 
Castles— building  of,  i.  148,  149;  definition  of,  i.  148;  not  to  be  imitated,  i. 

149;  proper,  no  longer  needed  or  possible,  i.  148;  cone  in  America,  i. 

151  (note);  Warwick  Castle,  i.  151  seqq. 
Casts  of  St.  Mark's,  i.  163.  169. 

Catechism,  won'c  make  good  servants,  ii.  94;  or  educate  children,  ii.  123. 
Cathartics,  use  of  by  ancients,  ii.  67. 
Catholics,  Roman,  and  Protestants,  ii.  4  seqq. 
Cellini,  i.  43. 

•'  Cestus  of  Aglaia."    (See  Ruskin.) 
Chamouni,  i.  174;  the  rocks  of,  i.  179;  land  destroyed  at,  ii.  116. 


INDEX.  219 

Champagne,  demand  for,  ii.  45. 

Chantrey,  Sir  F.,  i.  21,  23. 

Chapman,  Mr.  (of  Glasgow  Atlienceum\  ii.  124. 

Character  formed  by  employment,  ii.  132. 

Charity,  ii.  131;  invalid  charities,  ii.  139;  "an  object  of  "  (letter),  ii.  186. 

Charity-children  singing  at  St.  Paul's,  ii.  149. 

Charles  the  Bold,  ii.  28. 

Charlottenburg.  tomb  of  Queen  Louise  at,  i.  12,  and  note. 

Chartres  Cathedral,  i.  154. 

"Chasing."  meaning  of  the  word,  ii.  176  (note). 

Chiaroscuro,  i.  4;  of  Leech,  i.  111. 

•'  Child  Waters,"  ballad  of,  i.  77  (note). 

China,  war  in,  ii.  17. 

Chivalry,  the  foundation  of,  ii.  143  seqq. 

"  Chorus,"  ii.  148. 

Christ,  offices  of,  to  the  soul,  i.  68,  69. 

Christ  Church,  Dean  of,  and  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  170. 

Chrinilnu  Life,  The  (Dec.  20,  1879),  Letter  on  Co-operation  in,  ii.  73. 

Christie  and  Manson,  sales  by,  i.  77  (note),  ii.  69,  ii.  183  (note). 

Chrysanthema,  ii.  183. 

Cimabue,  r.necdole  relating  to,  i.  9,  and  note;  his  picture  of  the  Virgin,  ih.\ 

teaches  Giotto,  i.  25  (note). 
Cinderella,  ii.  100. 

Cirencester,  Agricultural  College  at,  ii.  115. 
Citadel,  definition  of  a,  i.  148. 
Civet,  ii.  97. 
Claude,  i.  24;  challenged  by  Turner,  i.  46,  and  note;  his  "Seaport"  and 

"  Mill,"  ib. ;  pictures  of,  restored,  i.  46  (note).     (See  National  Gallery.) 
Cleopatra  dissolving  the  pearl,  i.  50. 
Coal,  how  to  economize  English,  ii.  135. 
Cocker,  Edward,  arithmetician  (b.  1631,  d.  1677),  ii.  42. 
Coincidence,  a  strange,  ii.  104  (note),  104. 
Colen,  ii,  120. 

Colenso,  Bishop,  ii.  98  (note);  his  book  on  the  Pentateuch,  ib. 
Collins,  C.  A.,  i.  60  seqq. ;  ib.  (note);  his  "  Convent  Thoughts,"  ib. ;  portrait 

of  Wm.  Bennett,  ib.;  his  writings,  ib. 
Cologne,  the  "  Rubens"  at,  i.  39. 
Colonization,  ii.  87,  ii.  128. 
Color,  and  design,  i.  29;  eye  for,  rare,  i.  15;  the  laws  of,  how  far  defined. 

i.  137;  "scarlet"  the  purest,  ii.  196;  of  water,  i.  197. 
Combe,  Mr.,  purchase  of  the  "  Light  of  the  World"  by,  i.  67  (note). 
Commandments,  the  Ten,  ii.  142. 

Commercial  morality  (letter),  ii.  70;  putrefaction,  ii.  74. 
Commons,  House  of,  tone  of  debate  on  Denmark,  ii.  18. 
Conscience,  the  light  of,  1.  68. 
Conscription,  forms  of  true,  ii.  137. 


220  INDEX. 

Consistency,  the  nature  of  true,  i.  25  (note). 

Contemporary  Review,  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith's  article  in  (Dec,  1872),  ii.  66 

(note);  Mr.  Ruskin's  "Home  and  its  Economies"  in  (May,  1873),  ii.  144 

(note);  "Letters  on  the  Lord's  Prayer"  in  (Dec,  1879),  ii.  143. 
Conventionalism  in  Art,  i.  142. 
Conway  Castle,  i.  151. 

Co-operation,  letters  to  Mr.  G.  J.  Holyoake  on,  ii.  73,  74 
Copenhagen,  ii.  32. 

Copies,  of  pictures  in  England  and  Italy,  i.  106;  of  Turner,  i.  105. 
Cornhill  Magazine,  Mr.  Ruskia's  article  on  Sir  Joshua  and  Holbein  (March 

1860),  ii.  12  (note). 
Cornwall,  clear  water  on  coast  of,  i.  196. 
Correggio,  i.  47,  75,  96;  copies  of,  i.  106;  in  the  Louvre,  i.  50. 
Correspondence,  Mr.  Ruskin's  excuses  from,  ii.  186. 
Cotopuxi,  i.  183. 
Cotton,  subsiitut:s  for,  ii.  158. 
Coventry,  riband-makers  of,  ii.  80,  136;  Co-operative  Record,  letter  in,  on 

co-opeiuliu.„,  ii.  73  (note). 
CramlinL,ton,  strike  at,  ii.  106,  and  note. 
Crawford  Place,  ii.  105,  and  note. 
Creation,  man  its  greatest  marvel,  i.  96. 
Cricklade,  i.  53  (note). 
Criticism  (See  Art-criticism),  List  of  Letters  on  literary,  ii.  161 ;  literary,  ii. 

105,  167;  position  of  critics,  ii.  167;  the  Goddess  of  Criticism,  ib.  (note); 

rarity  of  good,  i.  3. 
Crime,  bow  to  prevent,  ii.  134;  and  drunkenness,  ii.  130;  and  madness,  ii. 

130  (note). 
Criminal  classes,  letter  and  pamphlet  on  the,  ii.  131,  132  seqq.;  how  to  treat 

criminals,  ii.  130. 
Cronstadr,  ii.  32. 

Crossing-sweepers  in  Utopia  and  London,  ii.  119. 
Crown,  the,  jewels,  i.  53. 
Cruelty  to  animals,  ii.  127  (note). 
"  Cruise  upon  Wheels,"  A,  i.  61  (note). 
Curtius,  ii.  4  (note). 
Custozza,  ii.  4  (note). 

Cuyp,  pictures  of  in  National  Gallery,  i.  39,  and  note. 
Daily  News,  The,  Letter  of  Mr.  Ruskin  "on  Co-operation"  in  (June  19, 

1880),  ii.  73;  Speech  of  Mr.  Ruskin  at  the  Society  for  the  Prevention  of 

Cruelty  to  Animals  (July  11,  1877),  ii.  128  (note). 
Daily  Telegraph,  The,  Letters  and  Articles  in  (in  order  of  date): — 

(Oct.  28, 1864)  "  The  Law  of  Supply  and  Demand,"  ii.  39. 
(Oct.  31,  1864)  "  "  '♦  ii.  40. 

(Nov.  3,  1864)  "  "  "  ii.  43. 

(Dec.  20,  1865)  "The  Jamaica  Insurrection,"  ii.  20. 

Carlyle's  Letter  to  the  Eyre  Defence  Ftmd,  ii.  22  (note). 


INDEX.  221 

(Sept  5. 1865)  "Domestic  Servants"— Mastership,  II.  93. 
(Sept.  7,  I8(i5)  "  "  Experience,  ii.  95. 

(Sept.  18,  1865)  "  "  Soiiship  and  Slavery.  H.  90. 

Articles,  etc.,  on  servants,  ii.  U4  (note),  U'J  (note),  102 (note). 
(Oct.  17,  1865)  "Modern  Houses,"  ii.  104. 

Other  correspondence  on  houses,  ib.  uiote). 
(Dec.  8,  1865)  "Our  Railway  System,'  ii.  88. 

Article  on  railways,  ib.  fnote). 
(Jan.  22, 1863)  "An  object  of  charity,"  ii.  186. 

Article  on  .Matilda  Griggs,  ib.  (note). 
(July  16.  18G8)  Strikes,  Mr.  Ruskin's  Proposition  as  to,  ii  65  (note). 
(July  31.  1868) "Is  England  big  enough?"  ii.  79. 

Article,  "  3Iarriage  or  Celibacj-,"  ib.  (note). 
(Aug.  6,  1868)  "  The  Ownership  of  Railways,"  ii.  81.  ' 

Articles  on  railways,  ib.  (note)  83. 
(Aug.  10, 1868)  "  Railway  Economy,"  ii.  83. 

"  Fair  Play's"  letter  on  railways,  ii.  83,  84,  84  (note). 
"  East  End  Emigrants,"  article,  ii.  87  (note). 
(Dec.  26, 1868)  "Employment  for  the  Destitute  Poor  and  Criminal  Classes,"  ii. 
131. 
"Employment,  etc."  (pamphlet),  ii.  132 (note),  134  (note). 
(Jan.  15,  1870)  "The  MoraUty  of  Field  Sports,"  ii.  127. 

Articles  on  sport,  ib.  (note). 
(Oct.  7,  1870)  "The  Franco-Prussian  War,  ii.  22. 
(Oct.  8,  1870)  "  "  "     ii.  25. 

(Nov.  30, 1870)  "  Railway  Safety,"  ii.  89. 

Article  on  railway  accidents,  ib.  (note). 
(Jan.  12,  1871)  "  A  King's  first  duty,"  ii.  111. 

Article  on  the  Roman  Inundations,  ib.  (note);  ii.  165, 
(Jan.  19.  1871)  "  Notre  Dame  de  Paris,"  i.  154. 
(Feb.  4,  1871)  "  The  Waters  of  Comfort,"  ii.  115. 
(Feb.  7,  1871)  "The  Streams  of  Italy,"  ii.  116. 
(Feb.  21, 1871)  "Woman's  sphere,"  extract  from  a  letter  of  Mr.  Ruskin  to  Miss 

FaithfuU,  ii.  154  (note). 
(Dec.  8.  1871)  Article  on  Taverns,  i.  151  (note). 
(Dec.  11,  1871)  "  Drimkenness  and  Crime,"  ii.  129. 
(Dec.  22, 1871)  "  Castles  and  Kennels,"  i.  151. 
(Dec.  25,  1871)  "  Verona  v.  Warwick,"  i.  152. 

Articles  on  Warwick  Castle,  i.  151, 152  (note). 
(July  5,  1876)  "  Turner  s  Drawings,"  i.  100  seqq. 
(July  19,  1876)         "  "  i.  104. 

Dancing,  art  of.  ii.  148. 

Danger  and  difficulty,  how  far  factors  in  regulating  wage.s,  ii.  52. 

Dante  quoted,  ii.  15,  and  note.     (See  also  Cary.) 

Darkness,  effect  of,  on  drawings,  i.  89. 

David,  restoration  of  Raphaels  by,  i.  38. 

Daybreak,  ii.  177. 

Dcane,  Sir  Thomas,  i.  125  (note). 

Dearie.  Mr.  T.,  his  "  Evening  on  the  Marchno,"  i.  70,  and  note. 

Decoration,  delicate  and  rougii,  i.  137,  138. 

Demand,  law  of  supply  and,  letters  on,  39-44;  foolish,  ii.  100;  the  largest, 

that  of  hell,  ib. 
Denmark,  the  position  of,  in  1863,  ii.  17  seqq. 


222  INDEX. 

Denudation,  i.  181,  182;  its  place  in  physical  mythology,  i.  183,  184. 

Derby,  the,  1859,  ii.  10  (note). 

"  Derby  Day,"  Frith's,  i.  55.    (See  also  i.,  xvii.  note.) 

De  Saussure,  i.  188,  189  (note). 

Deucalion,  the  myth  of,  i.  183. 

"Deucalion"  referred  to.     (See  Euskin,  books  quoted.) 

Diagrams,  illustrating  rainbow  reflections,  i.  201,  202. 

Dickens,  letter  of,  to  Mr.  Bennett,  ii.  183  (note);  bibliography  of,  letters  in 

the,  ii.  190;  death  of,  ii.  125  (note).     "  Pickwick"  referred  to,  ii.  97. 
Dinner  tables,  modern,  ii.  59. 
"  Disciple  of  Art  and  Votary  of  Science,"  article  in  Liverpool  Albion,  ii.  187 

(note). 
Discovery,  the  merits  of,  i.  187  seqq. 
Distances,  focal,  i.  5. 

Dividends,  railway — a  tax  on  the  traveller,  ii.  82. 
Dogs,  Protestant  and  Catholic,  ii.  11;  "  dog  or  bee"  letter,  ii.  127. 
Domestic  servants.    (See  Servants.)    Meaning  of  word  "  domestic,"  ii,  102 

(note.) 
"Dones"  and  "undones,"  ii.  142. 
Doric  modes,  ii.  148. 
Drama,  reform  of  the,  ii.  193,  194. 
Drawing.     (See  Art.) 
Drawing-master,  the  first  work  of  a,  i.  28. 
Drawings,  chance  beauty  of  good,  i.  Ill;  subtlety  possible  in,  i.  93,  94  seqq. ; 

effect  of  light,  etc.,  on,  i.  83,  84,  102,  103,  105;  how  to  mount,  i.  83; 

how  to  frame,  i.  S3. 
Dreams,  Homeric  myth  as  to,  i.  75,  and  note. 
Dress,  right,  ii.  154  seqq.-,  national,  ii.  155;  dress-making,  ii.  139;  letter  on 

"sad  colored  costumes,"  ii.  156. 
Drunkenness,  and  Crime,  ii.  129;  a  crime  in  itself,  ih.;  instance  of  death 

by,  ii.  39  (note). 
Dudley,   Lord,    "Angelico"  in  the  collection  of  pictures  of,  i.  44,  and 

note. 
Dulwich,  railway  at,  ii.  97. 

Duncan's,  Mr.,  "  Shiplake,  on  the  Thames,"  i.  201  (note). 
Durer,  Albert,  i.  28,  63;  and  Holbein,  their  theology  of  death,  i.  118. 
Durham  Cathedral,  i,  161. 
Duty,  meaning  of  the  word,  ii.  63,  142. 

"  E.  A.  F."  letter  signed,  on  the  designs  for  the  "Foreign  Office,"  i.  99. 
"  Eagle's  Nest"  (see  Ruskin:  books  quoted),  ii.  146. 
Earth-Gods,  ii.  172. 

Eastlake,  Sir  C,  attack  on.  i.  37  (note),  39,  91;  his  knowledge  of  oil  pic- 
tures, i.  46.  47  (note);  his  paintings,  and  Byron's  poems,  i.  20. 

Mr.  C.  L.,  his  book  on  the  Gothic  Revival,  i.  155  (note). 

"  Economist,"  letter  in  Daily  Telegraph  from,  ii.  41,  44  (note). 


INDEX.  223 

Economy  defined,  its  three  senses,  ii.  157;  meaning  of  the  word,  ii.  lOo. 
(See  Political  Economy.) 

Edinburgh,  ii.  137;  improvements  at,  i.  14o,  150;  Sundays  at,  ii.  11; 
Trinity  Chapel,  i.  147;  University  of,  and  Prof.  Hodgson,  ii.  44  seqq. 

Castle,  alterations  at,  i.  147.  149,  150;  its  grandeur,  ib. ;  no  longer  a 

military  position,  i.  150. 

Castle  Rock,  its  place  among  Scotch  "  craigs.'  i.  146,  147;  proposal 

to  blast,  lb. 

Education,  list  of  letters  on,  ii.  121;  an  "average  first-class  man,"  i.  31; 
compulsory,  ii.  124;  division  of  studies,  i.  30;  employment  the  primal 
half  of,  li.  132;  involution  of  studies,  i.  31;  education-mongers,  ii.  49; 
place  of  science  in,  i.  133;  "true,"  letter  on,  ii.  123. 

Edward  the  Confessor,  i.  161. 

Egg,  yellow  spot  on,  ii.  73. 

Ehreuberg,  C.  G.,  i.  132,  133  (note). 

Electricity  use  of,  ii.  134. 

Elgin  marbles,  the,  i.  28. 

Ellis,  Mr.  Wynn.  i.  106  (note). 

Embankment  of  Italian  rivers,  plan  for,  ii.  112  seqg. 

Embroidery,  use  of,  ii.  157. 

Emigration,  ii.  87,  128. 

Employment,  ii.  134;  to  be  educational,  ii.  136;  fonns  character,  ii.  132; 
modes  of  for  poor,  ii.  138;  always  obtainable,  ii.  46,  196;  principles  of, 
ii.  134  seqq. 

England,  big  enough?  (letter)  ii.  79;  buildings  of  destroyed,  i.  151;  and 
Denmark,  ii.  17,  18;  France  and,  1859,  ii.  9;  1870,  ii.  28;  independent, 
ii.  99;  and  Italy,  1859,  ii.  6;  and  Italian  inundations,  ii.  113  (note), 
117;  and  Italy,  their  treatment  of  art,  i.  9;  literature  of,  i.  118; 
"machine-and-devil  driven,"  ii.  124  (note);  and  Poland,  ii.  19;  pro- 
tection of  pictures  in,  i.  37;  and  the  Reform  Bill,  1867,  ii.  133;  shop- 
keepers, a  nation  of?  ii.  100;  trade  and  policy  of,  ii.  28;  and  war, 
ii.  16,  17,  19. 

Enid,  ii.  100. 

Enterprise,  public  and  private,  ii.  86. 

"Epitaphs,"  the  Essay  on,  ii.  99. 

Epictetus,  ib. 

Eridanus,  ii.  111. 

Etching,  George's,  Ernest,  i.  113  seqq. ;  principles  of,  t'h. ;  (a)  chiaroscuro, 
116;  (A)  few  lines,  116;  (r)  a  single  biting  enough,  115;  ((/)  use  pencil, 
116;  thirteenth  century  work  and  its  imitators,  ib. 

Etruscan  work,  ii.  178. 

Equity  and  Law,  ii.  62. 

Evening  Journal,  The  (Jan.  22,  1855),  review  of  "Animals  of  Scripture" 
in,  ii.  172. 

Examination.     (See  Art.) 

Examiner,  The,  review  of  "  Our  Sketching  Club"  in,  ii.  165,  and  note. 


i 


224  INDEX. 

Expenditure,  objects  of  public,  i.  102;  national,  on  pictures,  parks,  and 

peaches  respectively,  i.  92. 
'•  Eye- witness,  The,"  i.  61  (note). 
Eylau,  battle  of,  ii.  30. 
Eyre,  Governor,  and  the  Jamaica  Insurrection,  iL  20,  and  note. 

Failure,  the  lesson  of,  i.  23,  125,  126. 

"  Fair  Play,"  letter  of  in  Daily  Telegraph,  ii.  83  (note),  84-86  (note). 

Fairservice  {see  Scott,  Sir  Walter),  ii.  97  (note). 

Faithfull,  MissE.,  lecture  by,  ii.  154  (note);  letter  to,  ib. 

Fallacies,  a  priori,  ii.  50. 

Family,  meaning  of  the  word,  ii.  102. 

Farinata,  ii.  15,  and  note. 

Fashion,  change  of,  ii.  155;  how  to  lead,  ii.  157. 

Fate  and  trial,  the  laws  of,  i.  125  (note). 

Father's,  a,  counsel  to  his  son,  ii.  147. 

Fauna,  Oxford  prize  for  essay  on  the,  i,  132  (note). 

Fesch,  Cardinal,  "  Angelico"  in  the  collection  of,  i.  44,  and  note. 

Fielding,  Copley,  and  Mr.  Ruskin,  i.  192. 

Field  sports,  morality  of,  ii.  127. 

Fiesole,  i.  9. 

Finden,  engraving  in  Rogers'  Poems,  i.  93. 

Fine  Art  Society,  i.  105  (note),  159,  166. 

Finlason,  G.  W.,  "  History  of  the  Jamaica  Case"  referred  to,  ii.  22  (note). 

Florence,  "Angelico"  destroyed  at,  i.  38;  and  floods,  ii.  117;  gallery  of,  i. 
50;  Ghibelline  proposal  to  destroy,  ii.  15  (note);  revenge  in  old,  ii.  64 

Flowers,  use  of  in  architecture,  i.  141  seqq.\  "  Alisma  Plantago,"  i.  61;     i| 
Chrysanthema,  ii.  183;  Gentian,  i.  204. 

Fonte  Branda,  ii.  118.  ; 

Food,  amount  of,  determines  wages  and  price,  ii.  65.  I 

Forbes,  George,  Prof.,  i.  187  (note).  j  i 

Forbes,  James  David,  i.  176;  letter  on  "  his  real  greatness,"  i.  177  seqq. ;  and     \ 
Agassiz,  i.  176,  190;  his  "Danger  of  Superficial  Knowledge"  quoted,     f '  ( 
i.  189  (note);  letter  to  Mr.  Ruskin,  i.  190;  letter  of  a  pupil  of,  to  Mr.     '  ( 
Ruskin,  i.  190.  U  ( 

Force,  use  of  human,  ii.  134  seqq.  |  c 

Foreground  and  background,  painting  of,  i.  6.  \  ^ 

"Forester,"  lecture  of  in  Daily  Telegraph  on  Field  Sports,  ii.  128  (note).  \ 

Forster's  Life  of  Dickens,  ii.  125  (note). 

Fortnightly  Review,  Mr.  Freeman  and  Mr.  Trollope  on  field  sports,  ii.  127     .  g 
(note).  I  I. 

Fortress,  definition  of  a,  i.  148.  ;  g. 

Fortunes,  rapidly  accumulated,  ii.  85;  inequality  of  desirable,  ib. 

Fountain  of  joy  at  Siena,  ii.  118. 

Fox-hunting,  ii.  128. 

Fra  Bartolomeo,  none  in  National  Gallery,  i.  44,  and  note. 


INDEX.  '  225 

Framing,  methods  of,  for  delicate  drawings,  i.  83. 

France  and  Austria,  loss  of  in  war,  ii.  83;  cathedrals  of,  154;  empire,  war 

the  key-note  of  the  first,  vice  of  the  second,  ii.  26;  position  of  in  1859, 

ii.  9. 
Franco-Prussian  war,  letters  on,  ii.  8€qq.\  cause   of,  ii.  26;  character  of 

the  contest,  ii.   27;  Germany  to  stop  within  limits,   ii.   28;  loss  of 

property  in,  ii.  32,  33;  misery  of,  ii.  112,  and  note;  England's  position 

as  regards,  ii.  28;  refugees  during,  ii.  154  (note);  the  Saiutc  Chapelle 

in  danger  during,  i.  154. 
Franchise,  female,  ii.  154  (note). 
"Frange,"  ii.  178. 
"Frango,"  ii.  178. 

Frasers Magazine {:i\i\y,  1875),  letter  on  "Modem  Warfare,"  ii.  29. 
Frederick  the  Great,  his  statue  at  Berlin,  ii.  12  (note);  his  wars,  virtue  of, 

ii.  27. 
Freedom,  "not  to  be  given,"  ii.  7,  8  (note). 
Freeman,-  Mr.  E.,  on  field  sports,  ii.  127  (note). 
Fr^re,  M.  Edouard,  escape  from  Paris,  ii.  23,  and  note. 
Fresco-painting,  laws  of,  determined  by  Perugino,  i.  117. 
"Fret,"  etymology  of,  ii.  178  seqq. 
"Frico,"ii.  178. 

Frith's,  Mr.,  "Derby  Day,"  i,  55.    (See  also  i.  xvii.,  note.) 
Fumivall,  Mr.,  letters  to,  ii.  177. 
Fuseli  quoted,  i.  59,  75. 

Gainsborough,  his  landscapes,  i.  13;  his  speed,  i.  112. 

Gardens,  ii.  158. 

Garisenda,  tower  of,  i.  169. 

Gas,  effect  of,  on  pictures,  i.  98,  105. 

Generalization  in  art,  i.  76. 

Geneva,  lake  of,  i.  180;  its  color,  i.  196;  letter  to  journal  at,  153;  Sundays 

at,  ii.  11. 
Genius,  the  tone  of  true,  i.  188,  189. 
Gentian,  letter  on  the,  i.  204 ;  species  of  the,  ib. 
Gentlemen,  duties  of,  to  their  peasantry,  ii.  128. 
Geological  letters,  i.  173,  seqq. 
Geology,  English  ti.  Alpine,  i.  181  !wqq.\  museum  of,  at  Sheffield,  ii.  126; 

Mr.  Ruskin's  study  of,  i.  173,  178;  work  needed  in  the  science,  i.  175. 

(See  also  Glaciers.) 
George,  Mr.  Ernest,  his  etchings,  i.  113  (note),  and  »eqq. 
"  Gerin,"  play  of,  mentioned,  ii.  194. 
Germany,  characteristics  of  the   nation,  ii.  7;  Emperor   of,  ii.  7  (note); 

Franco-Prussian  war  and,  ii.  22,  28;  heroism  of  a  German  girl,  ii.  100; 

German  soldiery,  ii.  7;  German  women,  type  of  features,  ii.  12. 
Ghibelline  faction  at  Florence,  ii.  15  (note). 
Ghirlandajo,  i.43;  no  picture  by  in  National  Gallery,  i.  44  (note). 


226  '        iiTDEX. 

Giagnano,  landslip  near,  i.  202. 

Gideon's  fleece,  i.  133. 

"Gil  Bias,"  ii.  186. 

Giorgione,  i.  75. 

Giotto,  his  "public,"  i.  15;  pupil  of  Cimabue,  i.  25,  and  note,  i.  43;  bis 

theology  of  death,  i,  118. 
Glaciers,  action  of  compared  "with  that  of  water,  i.  175-178;  excavation  of 

lake  basins  by,  i.  173  seqq.;  the  G.  des  Bois,  i.  178-180;  experiments 

with  honey  illustrating,  i.  178;  hardness  of,  i.  177;  motion  of,  i.  176, 

177. 
Gladstone,  Mr.,  ii.  142  (note);  his  "Juventuf  3Iundi,"  ii.  171  (note);  at 

Naples,  i.  18,  and  note;  and  Lord  Beaconsfield,  ii.  197. 
Glasgow,  ii.  137;  the  G.  Athenaeum,  ii.  124  (note);  the  Lord  Rectorship  of 

G.  University,  ii.  195  seqq. 
Glasgow  Herald,  The,  letters  in : — 

(June  5.  1874)  "The  Value  of  Lectures,"  ii.  124. 

(Oct.  7, 1880)  The  Lord  Rectorship  of  Glasgow  University  (four  letters),  ii.  195  seqq. 

(Oct  12,  1880)  The  Lord  Rectorship,  etc.,  ii.  197. 

Ghhe,  The  (Oct.  29,  1875),  ''An  Oxford  Protest"  in,  ii.  188. 

"G.  M.,"  letter  of,  in  the  Reader,  i.  185. 

Gneiss,  the  rocks  of  Chamouni  made  of,  i.  179. 

Gold,  depreciation  of,  ii.  37;  discoveries  of,  ih.  (note). 

Goldwin  Smith,  Mr.,  on  Luxury,  ii.  66  (note). 

Good  Words,  "  Animals  of  Scripture"  reprinted  in  (1861),  ii.  172  (note). 

Gosse,  Dr.  L.  A.,  ii.  158. 

Gothic  architecture,  adaptability  of,  i.  125  seqq.,  131,  132;  and  classic,  i.  99 

(note);  decoration   of,   i.  127,  138,  141;  efiPect  of  strength   in,  i.  168; 

employment  of  various  degrees  of  skill  in,  i.  129;  English,  Italian,  and 

Venetian,  i.  157;  and  the  Oxford  Museum,  i.  125  seqq.\  the  G.  Revival, 

i.  128,  129,  155  (note);  types  of  French,  i.  154. 
Government,  the  kind  of,  needed,  ii.  86. 
Gravelotte,  battle  of,  ii.  31. 

Great  Eastern  Railway  (article  in  Daily  Telegraph  on),  the,  ii.  83. 
Greece,  the  king  of,  ii.  21  (note);  oppressed  by  Greeks  only,  ii.  6;  and 

Venice,  relation  of  architecture,  i.  163. 
Greek  art,  study  of,  ii.  148. 
Grcnville,  Sir  Richard,  ii.  4  (note). 
Greppond,  glacier  of,  ii.  116. 

Groswell,  Rev.  R.,  and  the  Oxford  Museum,  i.  139. 
Grief,  effect  of  trifles  on  minds  distressed  by,  i.  72. 
Griggs,  Matilda,  ii.  186,  and  note. 

"Growing  old,"  article  on,  in  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,  ii.  140. 
Grumio.     (See  Shakespeare.) 
Guelfi,  faction  at  Florence,  ii.  15  (note). 
Guido,  pictures  by,  in  the  National  Gallery,  i.  43. 


INDEX.  227 

Guthrie,  letter  to  Dr.,  ii.  184. 

Guy's  bowl  at  Warwick  Castle,  i.  153. 

Hamilton,  Sir  W.'s  Logic,  ii.  56. 

Hanging,  who  deserve,  ii.  131. 

Hanover,  Sundays  at.  ii.  11. 

Harbor-making,  ii.  138. 

Harding,  i.  23. 

Harold  the  Saxon,  i.  161.      . 

Harrison,  letter  to  W.  H.,  ii.  193. 

Hartz  minerals,  purchase  of  by  Mr.  Ruskin,  ii.  58. 

Hartz  mountains,  ii.  13. 

Hasselt's  "  Histoire  de  Rubens"  referred  to,  i.  14  (note). 

Hawley's,  Sir  J.,  "  Musjid  "  (Derby  winner),  ii,  10  (note). 

Health,  chair  of  Physical,  at  Oxford,  ii.  147. 

Hemling,  i.  65. 

Henry  VI.  's  Psalter,  i.  54,  and  note. 

Herodotus  referred  to,  1.  184.     (See  also  Bubastis.) 

Heroism,  true  forms  of,  ii.  24;  instance  of,  ii.  100;  and  vice,  ii.  133. 

Hervet,  Gentian,  his  "  Economist  of  Xenophon,"  ii.  149  (note). 

Hervey,  Lord  Francis,  i.  100  (note). 

Highlanders,  a  characteristic  of,  ii,  6. 

Highlands,  the  rocks  of  the,  i.  146. 

Historical  monuments,  loss  of,  in  England,  i.  158;  and  small  interest  taken 

in,  i.  29. 
History,  true,  w^hat  it  is,  i.  38 ;  how  written  hitherto,  ib. 
Hobbes,  definition  of  Justice,  ii.  57  (note),  61. 

Hodgson,  Professor,  and  Mr.  Ruskin  on  supply  and  demand,  ii.  44  scqq. 
Hogarth,  his  "public,"  i.  14;  his  "Two  'prentices,"  ii.  144. 
Holbein,  the  libel  on,  37  (note),  45,  and  note;  portrait  of  George  Gyzen  at 

Berlin,  ii.  13,  13  (note);  Jiis  quiet  work,  i.  113;  Mr.  Ruskin's  article  on, 

ii.  13  (note);  his  theology  of  death,  i.  118;  TVornum's  life  of,  ii.  13  (note). 
Holy  Sepulchre,  and  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  163. 
Holyoake,   Mr.  G.  J.,  letters  on  Co-operation  to,  ii.  73;  his  "History  of 

Co-operation,"  ii.  73  (note);  reference  to  Mr.  Ruskin  in  America,  ii.  73, 

and  note;  and  the  Sheffield  Museum,  ib. 
Homer,  Odyssey  quoted  or  referred  to:  (vi.  90),  ii,  109,  170 (note);  (xix,  563), 

i.  75;  (xxii.  end),  ii.  102. 
Honiton  lace-makers,  ii.  136,  137. 
"  Honos,"  existence  of  any  absolute,  ii.  63. 
Horace,  expurgated  editions  of,  ii.  147;  his  theology  of  death,  i.  11«;  quoted 

or  referred  to,  ii.  57  (Odes.  iii.  3.  1),  98,  111  (Odes,  iii.  16,  39),  and  note, 

143;  study  of,  in  England,  ii.  143. 
Horeb,  i.  133. 
House-AoW,  ii.  101. 
Houses,  letter  on  modern,  ii.  104. 


228  INDEX. 

Huddersfield  and  the  Jamaica  Insurrection,  ii.  20. 

Hughes,  Mr.  T.,  M.P.  for  Lambeth,  ii.  20  (notes). 

Hullah,  Mr.,  on  music,  i.  25  (note),  26. 

Hume,  Mr.  Hamilton,  and  the  Eyre  Defence  Fund,  ii.  22  (note). 

Hunt,  Mr.  Alfred,  and  the  Liverpool  Academy,  i.  73  (note). 

Mr.  Holman,  i.  71;  "  Awkening  Conscience,  The,"  i.  71;  his  early 

work  criticised  in  the  Times,  i.  59  (note);  exaggerates  reflected  light,  i. 

64;  "Light  of   the   World,"   i.   67  seqq.;   technical   details  of,  i.  68; 

"Valentine  rescuing  Sylvia,"  i.  60  (note),  ^3,  64  seqq. 

William,  i.  121.   (Mr.  Ruskin's  "  Notes  on  Prout  and  Hunt,"  referred 

to.     See  Ruskin.) 
Hunting,  ii.  128. 
Husbands,  duty  of,  ii.  153. 
"Hymn,"  meaning  of,  ii.  148. 
Hyssop,  ii.  155. 

Ideal,  definition  of  the,  i.  7,  and  note. 

Idle,  treatment  of  the,  ii.  135. 

"Illustrations  of  Scripture,"  ii.  172. 

Imagination,  no  food  for,  in  modern  life,  ii.  147. 

Increased  Railway  Fares  (articles  in  Daily  Telegraph),  ii.  81  (note). 

Indians,  ideas  of  duty  in,  ii.  6;  irrigation  in  India,  ii.  115. 

Infidelity,  modern,  i.  147. 

Ingoldsby  Legends  ("Jackdaw  of  Rheims")  referred  to,  ii.  180. 

Initials,  no  need  of,  in  scientific  discussion,  i.  186. 

Iniquity,  an  exploded  word,  ii.  107. 

Interest,  one's  own,  ii.  7,  ii.  48. 

Interference,  public,  with  the  individual,  ii.  133. 

Intervention,  principles  of,  ii.  7,  9,  10. 

Inundations,  ii.  111-119. 

Iron  manufacture,  ii.  49;  modern  iron-work,  ii.  127. 

Irrigation  for  Italy,  ii.  114,  115. 

Irving's,  Mr.,  "  Shylock,"  ii.  262. 

Isle  of  Dogs,  emigration  from  the,  ii.  87.  ^ 

Italian  and  English  treatment  of  art,  i.  9;  masters,  pencilling  of,  i.  112; 
mannerisms  of  Italian  masters,  i.  4. 

Italy,  state  of  in  1859,  letters  on,  ii.  3,  9,  13;  extent  of  question,  ii.  14;  posi- 
tion of,  ii.  9;  passions  of  people  noble,  ii.  113 (note);  power  of,  ii.  117; 
self-government,  ii.  6;  streams  of ,  1\Q  seqq. 

"Italy,"  a  reputed  Turner,  i.  106,  and  note. 

"Jackdaw  of  Rheims"  (Ingoldsby  Legends),  ii.  180. 

Jamaica  Insurrection  and  Governor  Eyre,  ii.  20  seqq. 

Jameson's  "Early  Italian  Painters"  referred  to,  i.  9  (note);  "History  of 

Our  Lord,"  i.  38  (note),  44  (note). 
Jameson's  "  Scotch  Ballads,"  i.  76,  77  (note). 


t 


INDEX.  229 

Janssens,  Abraham,  and  Rubens,  i.  14. 

Japan,  war  in,  ii.  17. 

"Jean  dc  Nivelle"  mentioned,  ii.  194. 

Jena,  battle  of,  ii.  30,  33. 

Jerusalem,  ii.  177. 

Jezebel,  ii.  174. 

Johnson,  Mr.  Richard,  on  commerce,  ii.  70;  and  note. 

Journal  de  Geneve,  L'Esph'ance,  1873,  Letter  on  Women's  Work,  ii.  153. 

Judgment-throne,  condemnation  from  the,  ii.  142. 

Jukes,  Mr.  T.  B.,  F.R.S.,  letters  on  geology,  etc.,  i.  181  (note),  184. 

Jussum,  ii.  52,  53. 

Just  price,  a,  ii.  106  (note). 

Justice,  abstract,  ii.  54;  conceivable  as  a  hideously  bad  thing,  ii.  61  (note), 
63;  definition  and  derivation  of,  ii.  52;  defined  as  "conformity  with 
any  rule,  good  or  bad,"  ii.  54.  58 '(note),  61;  need  of,  ii.  10;  principles  of 
ii.  48;  different  words  for,  ii.  52. 

Justinian,  summary  of  law  by.  ii.  63,  and  note. 

Katharine's  instrument  (see  Shakespeare),  ii.  178. 

Kail  leaf,  the,  used  in  Melrose  Abbey,  i.  141  (note).    (See  Scott,   "The 

Abbot,"  chap.  xvi. ;  "The  Monastery,"  Introduction). 
Keble  College,  Oxford,  "The  Light  of  the  World  "  at,  i.  67 (note). 
Kennedy,   Mr.   T.   S.,  copy  of  Turner's  "  Fluelen"  possessed  by,  i.  105 

(note). 
Kensington  Museum,  Art  School  at,  100  (note);   Turners  at,  i.  98  (note). 

Kidderminster    Times,   The   (July    28,   1877),    letter  on    "  Ribbesford 

Church,"  i.  158. 
King  Charles  the  Martyr,  ii.  68-9. 

King,  the  first  duty  of  a,  ii.  Ill;  must  govern  the  rivers  of  his  countrj%  ib. 
Kinglake,  Mr.  A.  W.,  on  Savoy  and  Denmark,  ii.  19, 
Kingsley's,  Charles,   "  Ode  to  the  North-East  Wind,"  ii.  50  (note). 
Kingsley,  Mr.,  of  Sidney  Sussex  College,  on  optics,  i.  94-6. 
Kiss'  Amazon,  ii.  13,  12  (note). 
Koniggratz,  battle  of,  ii.  31. 

Labor,  as  a  discipline,  ii.  136;  the  forces  of,  order  of  their  employment,  ii. 

87,  135;  giving  of  the  best  charity,  ii.  131;  its  influence  on  character, 

ii.  133;  price  of,  ii.  40,  65;  promise  to  find,  ii.  72. 
"La  Fille  du  Tambour  Major,"  Offenbach's,  mentioned,  ii.  194. 
Lake  basins,  excavated  by  glaciers,  i.  174  (see  Glaciers). 
Lambeth,  Mr.  T.  Hughes,  M.P.  for,  ii.  20,  21. 
Lammermuirs,  the,  i.  146. 

Lancet,  The,  foimdcd  l)y  Mr.  Wakley,  i.  19  (note). 
Landseer,  i.  23,  63  (note);  illustrated  by  Burn.s,  i.  19. 
Landslip  near  Giagnano,  letters  on,  i.  202. 
"Langhame Castle, "Turner's,  i.  102,  and  note. 


230  IKDEX. 

"  Le  Chalet"  mentioned,  ii.  194. 

Launce  (see  Shakespeare),  ii.  97. 

Law  Courts,  the  uew,  i.  156,  and  note. 

Laws,  criminal,  ii.  133;  equity  and  law,  ii.  63;  eternal,  and  practical  diffi- 
culties, ii.  95;  of  nature,  ii.  72,  summary  of  law,  by  Blackstone  and 
Justinian,  ii.  63,  and  note;  lex  talionis,  lex  gratiae,  ii.  64. 

Lazarus,  ii.  173. 

Leconfield,  "  Turner"  in  possession  of  Lord,  i.  106  (note). 

Lectures,  the  value  of,  i.  ii.  124,  and  note. 

Lee,  Fred.  Richard,  R.A.,  i.  13,  and  note. 

Leech,  John,  letter  on  his  outlines,  i.  Ill;  characteristics  of  his  work,  ib.; 
chiaroscuro,  "felicity  and  prosperous  haste,"  i.  112;  death  of,  i.  Ill 
(note);  especial  value  of  first  sketches,  i.  112;  fastidious  work,  i.  113; 
proposal  to  distribute  his  drawings  among  national  schools,  i.  113,  i.  54 
(note). 

Leicester  Chronicle  and  Mercury  (Jan.  31,  1880),  letter  on  "Purchase  of  Pic- 
tures," i.  55. 

Leicester,  proposal  for  picture-gallery  at,  i.  55. 

Leith,  Mr.  J.,  and  the  Blackfriars  Bible  class,  Aberdeen,  ii.  142  (note). 

Lennox,  Lord  H.,  i.  52  (note);  i.  100  (note). 

Lenses  and  specula,  grinding  of,  i.  95. 

Leonardo  da  Vinci,  i.  75;  designed  canals  of  Lombardy,  ii.  118. 

Leone  Levi,  M.,  and  statistics  of  drink,  ii.  129. 

Leonidas,  ii.  4  (note). 

L'Esperance,  Geneva,  letter  "Women's  Work"  in,  ii.  153. 

Letter,  "  to  the  author  of  a  review,"  ii.  187;  black  letter,  ii.  175  (note),  256; 
letters,  carriage  of,  ii.  82,  90.  (See  for  the  letters  in  the  book  the 
Tables  of  Contents  and  the  Index  under  the  special  headings.  Appen- 
dix ;  Architecture ;  Art  Criticism  and  Art  Education ;  Education ;  Lit- 
erary Criticism;  Pictures  and  Artists;  Political  Economy;  Politics; 
Pre-RaphaeUtism ;  Public  Institutions  and  the  National  Gallery;  Rail- 
ways; Roman  Inundations;  Science;  Servants  and  Houses;  Turner; 
War;  Women,  their  work  and  their  dress.) 

Lewis,  John,  i.  74;  "Encampment  under  Sinai,"  i.  117  (note);  "The 
Hhareem,"  i.  65,  and  note. 

"Liber  Studiorum,"  value  of,  i.  97;  sale  of  original  plates,  ii.  70. 

Liberalism,  modern,  ii.  197,  201. 

Liberty  and  order,  ii.  10;  and  slavery,  ii.  98,  99. 

Liebreich,  Dr.,  lecture  on  Turner  and  Mulready,  i.  155,  and  note. 

"Life's  Midday,"  song  in  "  Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,"  ii.  141. 

Light,  effect  of  on  drawings,  i.  89,  90,  98,  102,  105;  upon  water,  phenome- 
non of,  i.  191;  "  Light  of  the  World,"  i.  67  seqq. 

"Limner  and  Illumination,"  letter  on,  ii.  174. 

Limousin,  the,  ii.  28. 

Lincoln,  President,  death  of,  ii.  54,  and  note;  English  opinion  of,  ib. 

Lindisfarne,  i.  161. 


INDEX.  231 

Literature,  what  it  includes,  i.  30. 

Literary  criticism,  list  of  letters  on,  ii.  161. 

Literary  Gazette  (Nov.  13,  1858);  "Turner  Sketches  and  Drawings"  (letter), 

i.  88,  and  note;  mention  of  Edinburgh  Custle  in,  i.  147,  and  note. 
Liverpool  AWion — 

(January  11,  1858),  Letters  on  "  Pre-Raphaelitism  in  Liverpool,"  i.  73. 
(November  2.  18C3),  "The  Foreign  Policy  of  England,"  ii.  15. 
(November  9,  18?2),  "To  the  author  of  a  Review,"  ii.  1H7. 

Articles  on  "  Disciple  of  xSst  and  Votary'  of  Science"  in, 
*6.  (note). 

Liverpool  Academy,  i.  73  (note);  Institute,  Mr.  Ruskin's  refusal  to  lecture 

at,  ii.  15  (note);  pre-Raphaelitism  in,  i.  73  (note). 
Locke,  ii.  56. 

Logic,  instance  of  English,  ii.  98.     * 

Lombardy,  the  canals  of,  ii.  118;  insurrection,  ii.  4,  and  note. 
London,  ii.  201;  London  and  Northwestern  Railway  accidents,  ii.  89  (note); 

the  streets  of  (letter),  ii.  119  seqq.;  London  lleciew  (May  16,  1861),  letter 

on  "  The  Reflection  of  Rainbows,"  i.  201. 
Lorraine  and  Alsace,  ii.  28. 

Louise,  Queen  of  Prussia,  her  tomb,  ii.  12,  and  note. 
Louvre,   the,  arrangement  of,   i.   50;  preservation  of  drawings  at,  i.  87; 

richly  furnislied,  i.*92;  salon  carre,  i.  50;  pictures  in:  "Immaculate 

Conception,"  i.  87  (note),  88;  "Marriage  in  Cana,"  i.  87;  "Susannah 

and  the  Elders,"  i.  50  (note). 
Love,  the  conqueror  of  lust,  ii.  144,  147. 
Lowe,  Mr.,  and  Mr.  Ruskiu,  ii.  189. 
Lucerna  Valley,  the,  ii.  11,  12. 
Lucina(the  goddess  "who  brings  things  to  light,"  and  especially,  therefore, 

of  birth),  i.  179. 
Lust  (see  Love). 

Luxury,  of  the  present  age,  i.  18;  and  political  economy,  ii.  66,  67,  80. 
Lydian  modes,  ii.  148. 

"  M.  A.,"  Letter  on  "limner"  from,  ii.  174. 

"M.  A.  C,"  Letter  on  atmospheric  pressure  from,  i.  185. 

Macaulay,  Lord,  saying  of  quoted  and  criticised,  i.  189,  and  note;  tone  of 

his  mind.  i.  189. 
Machiavelli  quoted,  ii.  15  (note). 
Machinery,  use  of,  ii.  135. 

Macmillan's  Magazine  (Nov.,  1870),  "  Sad-colored  costumes,"  ii.  156. 
Madonna,  the,  and  Venus,  i.  162. 
Magdeburg,  sack  of,  ii.  32. 
Magenta,  ii.  3  (note),  31. 
Malamocco,  ii.  117. 
Malines,  "Rubens"  at,  i.  39. 


232  IKDEX. 

Manchester,  Art  Treasures  Exhibition,  1858,  i.  103  (note);  Chamber  of 
Commerce,  ii.  70  (note);  Dramatic  Reform  Association  of,  ii.  193  (note); 
Buskin  Society  of,  ii,  191. 

Manufacture  and  Art,  i.  29;  of  dress,  ii.  155. 

Marengo,  battle  of,  ii.  30. 

Market,  the  laws  of  honest,  i.  165  (note). 

Marks,  :Mr.  H.  S.,  R.  A.,  Letter  on  F.  Walker  to,  i.  116  seqq. 

Marriage,  ii.  147;  "Marriage  or  Celibacy"  (Daily  Telegraph  article  on),  ii. 
79  (note) 

Mars,  i.  162. 

Martin,  illustrated  by  Milton,  i.  20. 

Marylebone  Council,  ii.  105  (note). 

Maskelyne,  Mr.  Nevil  S.,  M.P.,  i.  53,  and  note;  his  work  on  minerals  at 
the  British  Museum,  i.  54, 

"Matilda  Y.,"  letter  of,  i.  10,  and  note;  Matilda  Griggs,  letter  on,  ii.  186. 

Mattie,  carefu'  (see  Scott's  "  Rob  Roy"),  ii.  97. 

Maw,  J.  H.,  Letter  from,  191  (note),  200  (note). 

Matthew,  St.,  ii.  8. 

Means  of  life,  the,  ii.  68,  69. 

Mechanical  power,  natural  to  be  used  before  artificial,  ii.  134. 

Medicine,  to  be  learnt  by  children,  ii,  147. 

Meduna,  M.,  and  St.  Mark's,  i.  188. 

Meissonier,  his  pictures,  i.  127.  • 

Melrose,  i.  141;  the  monks  of  (see  Scott's  "  Abbot, "  chap,  xvi.),  i.  141  (note). 

Mendelssohn,  ii.  169. 

Mercury,  experiment  with,  i,  197. 

Mestre,  ii.  5. 

Marlborough  House.     (See  Turner  Drawings.) 

Michael  Angelo,  i.  146. 

Milan,  the  French  in,  ii.  3  (note),  7. 

Mill,  J.  S.,  ii.  146  (note);  direction  of  his  thought,  ii.  21;  and  the  Jamaica 
Insurrection,  ii.  20-21;  political  economy  of,  ii.  71  (note). 

Millais,  Mr.,  i.  66  (note),  74;  criticised  in  the  Times  (1851);  i.  59  (note); 
early  work,  i.  59;  fiesh-painting  by,  i.  65;  painted  glass  of,  i.  66;  pic- 
tures of  mentioned:  "Autumn  Leaves,"  i.  76  (note);  "Blind  Girl," 
i.  73  (note),  77  (note);  early  sacred  picture  (1850),  i,  60;  "Ferdinand 
lured  by  Ariel,"  i,  60  (note);  "Mariana,"  i.  60  (note),  62,  63,  66;  "  Por- 
trait of  a  Gentleman  and  his  Grandchild,"  i.  60  (note);  "Pot  Pourri," 
ii.  185;  "Return  of  the  Dove  to  the  Ark,"  i.  60  (note),  63,  65;  "  Wives 
of  the  Sons  of  Noah,"  i.  63;  "  Woodman's  Daughter,"  i.  60  (note). 

IVIiller,  John,  collection  of  pictures  of,  i,  77  (note). 

IVIilton  quoted  ("  Comus,"  1.  301),  ii.  178;  "Paradise  Lost,"  i.  19. 

Mincio,  the,  6,  10,  118. 

Miniatures,  painting  of,  i.  117;  use  of,  121,  i.  127. 

Miscellaneous  Letters,  list  of  subjects,  ii.  75. 

Missal  paintings,  condition  of.  good,  and  why,  i.  90,  91. 


INDEX.  233 

Mistress,  an  ideal  house-,  ii.  102. 

Mitford,  Mary  Russell,  ii.  183  (note),  183. 

Mitrailleuse  and  musket,  relative  effect  of,  ii.  30. 

Mock-castles,  etc.,  i.  151. 

Modern  houses,  letter  on,  ii.  104;  world,  destruction  of  buildings  by  the, 

i.  158;  theology  of,  i.  118.     (See  also  Age,  the  Present.) 
"Modern  Painters."    (See  under  Ruskiu,  Mr.) 
Monetary  and  Mining  Gazette  (Nov.  13,  1875),  letter  on  "  The  Definition  of 

Wealth,"  ii.  71. 
Money,  true,  ii.  115;  definition  of,  ii.  71,  and  note;  distribution  of,  ii.  49;  ill 

got,  ill  spent,  ii.  144;  loss  of,  ii.  187;  how  made  and  lost,  ii.  79,  80;  pedi- 
gree of,  ii.  69;  how  the  rich  get  and  spend,  ii.  66-70;  value  of,  ii.  37; 

lowered  value  of,  its  effect,  ii.  38. 
Montanvert,  the,  i.  179. 
Montaperto,  battle  of,  ii.  15  (note). 
3[ont  Blanc,  guides  up,  ii.  52,  56,  58  (note);  Cenis  (and  James  Barry),  i.  15, 

16  (note);  St.  Angclo,  ii.  116;  Viso,  ii.  11. 
Monthly  Packet,  The  (Nov.  1863),  "  Proverbs  on  right  dress,"  ii.  155. 
Moore,  Mr.  Morris,  and  the  National  Gallery,  i,  37  (note),  47. 
Moore,  Thomas,  National  Airs,  "  Oft  in  the  stilly  night,"  referred  to,  i.  71; 

his  "Public,"  i.  14. 
Morality  of  Field  Sports,  ii.  127  seqq. 
Moore,  Sir  T.,  "Utopia"  of,  ii.  191. 
Morgarten,  battle  of,  ii.  4,  and  note. 
Morning  Chronicle  (Jan.  20,  1855),  "The  Animals  of  Scripture,  a  Review," 

ii.  172. 
Morning  Post^SnXy  7,  1864),  letter,  "  The  Position  of  Denmark,"  ii.  17. 
Morris,  ^Mr.  William,  and  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  170. 
Mosaic  Law,  the,  ii.  72. 
Mother,  place  of  a,  ii.  146. 
Mounting  of  drawings.     (See  Drawings.) 
Mozart,  ii.  169. 

Mulready,  i.  65.  66  (note);  Dr.  Licbreich  on,  i.  154,  and  note. 
Munro,  Mr.,  and  the  Oxford  Museum,  i.  139. 
Murchison,  Sir  Roderick,  and  the  Excavation  of  Glaciers,  i.  173  (note); 

and  the  Eyre  Defence  Fund,  ii.  22  (note). 
Murillo's  "  Immaculate  Conception,"  i.  87  (note),  88. 
Muscle,  use  of,  in  labor,  ii.  136. 
Museum,  a  modern,  ii.  126;    a  national    its  objects  and  uses,  i.  53-  St. 

George's,  ii.  186. 
Music,  ii.  158;  the  art  of,  ii.  148;  a  less  common  faculty  than  drawing,  i. 

26,  95;  ear  for,  commoner  than  eye  for  color,  i.  15. 
Miisjid,  Derby-winner,  ii.  10  (note). 
Mycenae,  ii.  178. 
Mythology,  ii.  171;  Christian  and  Greek,  i.  163;  and  religion,  i.  118. 


234  INDEX. 

Naples,  Mr.  Gladstone  and  the  political  prisoners  at,  ii.  18  (note);  storm 
at,  ii.  116. 

Napoleon  Bonaparte,  i.  44  (note),  49;  ii.  26;  the  Third,  ii.  6,  26,27;  pur- 
chase of  the  Louvre  "Murillo"  by,  i.  87. 

Nations,  "A  nation's  defences,"  ii.  113;  defences  of,  "do  not  pay!"  ii.  114; 
gain  and  loss  of,  79,  80;  their  quality  shown  in  that  of  their  servants, 
ii.  94;  their  strength  in  union,  not  in  number,  ii.  25. 

National  Gallery,  the  (see  also  Pictures);  debate  on  vote  for,  i.  86  (note); 
an  European  jest,  i.  38;  an  ideal  arrangement  of,  i.  48  seqq.,  50-52;  keep- 
ers of:  Eastlake,  Sir  C.,  i.  37  (note);  Uwins,  RA.,  i.  46  (note);  Wor- 
num,  i.  86;  Letters  to  Times  on,  i.  37,  45,  86;  a  new  gallery  proposed, 
1.  49,  51,  and  note;  no  Ghirlandajo  Fra  Bartolomeo,  or  Verrochio  in, 
i.  44  (note),  45;  Parliamentary  Blue  Books  referred  to,  i.  37  (note),  42 
(note),  46  (note),  48  (note);  popular  idea  of  its  object,  i.  48;  restoration 
of  pictures  in,  i.  37  (note)  and  seqq.,  45;  purchase  of  picli-res  for,  i, 
43,  44,  45;  strictures  on,  i.  42  (note);  the  Vernon  gift,  i.  50,  and  note. 

National  Gallery,  Pictures  referred  to  in  the — 

Albertinelli's  "Virgin  and  Child,"  1.  44  (note). 
Angelico's  "Adoration  of  the  Magi,"  ih. 

"         "  Christ  amid  the  Blessed,"  ib. 
Bellini,  "Doge  Leonardo  Loredano,"i.  45. 
Claude's  "  Slarriage  of  Isaac  and  Rebecca,"  i.  46  (note). 
"        "  Mill,"  i.  46  (note). 
"        "Queen  of  Sheba,"  i.  46  (note). 
"        "Seaport,"  i.  46  (note). 
Cuyp,  "Large  Dort,"  i.  39  (note). 
"     "Landscape,  Evening,"  i&. 
Guido,  "Lot  and  his  Daughters," i. 43. 
"       "Magdalen,"  ib.  (note). 
"       "St.  Jerome,"  i&. 
"       "  Susannah  and  the  Elders,"  ih. 
Holbein,  libel  on,  i.  37  (note),  45,  and  note. 
Lorenzo  di  Credi,  "  Virgin  and  Child,"  i.  44  (note). 
Perugino,  "Virgin  and  Child,  with  St.  Jerome  and  St.  Francis,"*. 
"         "  Virgin  and  Infant  Christ,  with  St.  John,"  ih. 

"        "  Virgin  and  Infant  Christ,  with  Archangels  Michael,  Raphael,  and 
Tobias,  2&.;  120. 
Poussin,  "  Sacrifice  of  Isaac,"  i.  3,  and  note. 
Rubens,  "  Judgment  of  Paris,"  i.  44,  and  note. 

"        "  Peace  and  War, "  i .  39. 
Titian,  " Bacchus  and  Ariadne," i.  40-54. 
Tiu-ner,  "  Dido  building  Carthage,"  i.  46,  and  note. 
"        "  The  sun  rising  in  a  mist,"  ih. 

Drawings  and  Sketches,  i.  .50,  and  note ;  81  (note). 
Van  Eyck,  "Jean  Arnolfini  and  his  wife,"  i.  46  (note). 
Velasquez,  "  Philip  IV.  hunting  the  Wild  Boar,"  i.  40. 
Veronese,  "Consecration  of  St.  Nicholas,"  i.  40,  and  note. 

"         "  Rape  of  Europa, ' '  ih. 
Wilkie,  "The  Blind  Fiddler,"  i.  7. 

Natural  History,  study  of,  i.  135;  letter  on,  i.  204. 

Nature  and  Art,  letter  on  "Art  Teaching  by  Correspondence"  in,  i.  32. 


INDEX.  236 

Nature,  general  ignorance  of,  i.  16;  human,  not  corrupt,  ii.  143;  its  lessons 

true,  i.  24;  neglect  of,  i.  17;  understanding  of,  ib. 
Neptune,  ii.  171. 

Neutrality,  the  "  difficulties  of,"  letter,  ii.  26;  of  England,  ii.  15. 
New  Shakespeare  Society,  letters  in  Transactions  of,  ii.  17G  »eqq. 
Newspaper,  duty  and  power  of  an  editor,  ii.  95. 
Newtonian  law,  i.  199  (note),  200. 
Newton's  "Principia,"  i.  14. 
New  Years  Address  and  Messages  to  BUickfriars  Bible  Class,  Aberdeen: 

"Act,  act  in  the  living  present"  (1873),  ii.  141. 
"  Laborare  est  orare"  (1874),  ii.  142. 
"A  Pagan  Message"  (1878),  ii.  143. 

Nineteenth  Century:  Mr.  Ruskin's  "Fiction,  Fair  and  Foul,"  quoted,  ii.  97 

(note). 
Nino  Pisano,  i.  43. 
Nobert,  line-ruling  by,  i.  94. 
Non-iquity,  ii.  107, 
Norton,  Prof.  C.E.  (U.S.A.),  letters  of  Mr.  Ruskin  to,  i.  86  (note),  97  (note), 

105  (note) ;  lecture  on  Turner,  ib. 
"Notes  on  Employment  of  the  Criminal  Classes"  (Da %  Telegraph,  \e\X&t 

and  pamphlet),  ii.  129-132  seqq. 
"Notes  on  Prout  and  Hunt"  (see  Ruskin.  Mr.),  i.  166  (note). 
"Notre  Dame  de  Paris,"  its  place  among  French  cathedrals,  i.  153. 
Norwich,  Dr.  Browne  at,  ii.  120,  and  note. 

"Oak  Silkworms,"  letter  in  Times  (Oct.  24,  1862)  on,  ii.  158. 

Obedience,  the  real  "  Divine  service,"  ii.  143. 

Offenbach's  "Fille  du  Tambour  Major"  referred  to,  ii,  194. 

Oil  painting,  determined  by  Titian,  i,  117. 

Old  Adam  (see  Shakespeare),  ii,  97. 

Old  Masters,  exhibition,  i.  106. 

Oliver,  Roland  for  an,  ii.  48. 

Opie.  i-  75. 

Optical  work,  delicacy  of,  i.  94,  95. 

Optics,  writers  on,  i.  195  (note). 

Organ,  street  nuisance  of,  ii.  18,  19  (note). 

Ornament,  natural  forms  in,  i.  129;  in  dress,  ii.  155. 

O'Shea,  and  the  O.xford  Museum,  i.  139, 142  (note). 

"  Ought  "  and  "  are,"  ii.  63. 

'  Our  Sketching  Club,"  ii.  165,  and  note. 

Oxford,  Balliol  oriel-window,  i.  135;  bishop  of,  on  education,  ii.  123  (note), 
178;  Bodleian  li])rary,  traceries  of,  i.  135;  Christ  Church,  fan-vaulting 
at,  ib. ;  drawing  schools,  i.  102,  113;  examinations,  letter  on,  i.  24;  meet- 
ing in  on  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  170;  printsellers,  ii.  144;  "An  Oxford 
Protest,"  ii.  188;  rich  buildings,  i.  135. 


236  ,  INDEX. 

Oxford  Museum,  the,  letters  on,  i.  125-145;  Acland,  Dr.,  his  lecture  on, 
quoted,  i.  125  (note),  130  (note),  132  (note);  building  of,  i.  125  (note); 
capital  in,  i.  141,  and  note;  decoration  of,  i.  127,  136,  137,  138,  143; 
porch  proposed,  i.  130;  sculpture  of,  i.  137;  spandril  in,  i.  144;  suc- 
cess of  its  Gothic  architecture,  i.  130;  its  teaching,  i.  138;  the  west  front, 
1.  139. 

Padua,  ii.  117. 

Painters,  how  roused  to  exercise   their  strength,  i.  139;  vision  of,  how  it 

affects  their  pictures,  i,  155. 
Painting  and  poetry,  closely  allied,  i.  19;  portrait-painting,  ii,  170. 
Pall  Mall  Gazette,  The— 

(April  18,  1865)  "  Strikes  v.  Arbitration,"  u.  48 
Articles  on  strikes,  ih. 

"  masters  and  men,  ii.  50,  and  note. 

(April  21, 1865)  "  Work  and  Wages,"  ii.  50. 
(    "      as,   "  )         "  "        ii.  5-2. 

(May     2,    "  )         "  "         ii.  54. 

(   "        9,   "  )         "  "         ii.  59. 

(    "       22,    "  )  '•  "         ii.  62. 

Interpolation  of,  in  Mr.  Ruskin's  letters,  ii.  57-59. 
(March  1, 1867)  "  At  the  Play,"  ii.  185. 
(May  1,  1867)  "  Standard  of  Wages,"  ii.  65. 
(January  31, 1868)  "  True  Education,"  ii.  123. 
(       "       19,  1871) ' '  A  Nation's  Defences,"  ii.  113. 
(December  28, 1871)  "  The  Streets  of  London,"  ii.  119. 
(March  16, 1872)  "Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence— a  defence,"  i.  154. 
(      "      21,    ")  "Mr.  Ruskin's  Influence— a  rejoinder,"  i,  156. 
(November  4,  1872)  "  Madness  and  Crime,"  ii.  KW. 
(January  24, 1873)  "  How  the  Rich  spend  their  Money,"  ii.  66. 
(        "       29,    "  )  "  "  "  ii.  67. 

(        "        31,    "  )  "  "  "  ii.  68. 

(       "        11, 1875)  "  A  Mistaken  Review,"  ii.  165. 
(       "       19,    ")  "The  Position  of  Critics,"  ii.  167. 

Pan-droseion,  i.  161. 

Parents  and  children,  relation  of,  ii.  145. 

Paris,  fortifications  of,  ii.  114;  in  Franco-Prussian  war,  ii.  25;  theatres  of, 

ii.  194. 
Parliament,  ii.  140;  of  1868,  ii.  133;  debate  on  Denmark,  ii.  27;  on  Turner 

bequest,  i.  86;  Houses  of,  ii.  175  (note),  176. 
Partnership  of  masters  and  men,  ii.  69,  and  note. 
Patmore,  Coventry,  i.  60  (note),  ii.  168,  171  (note). 
Paton,  Waller,  R.S.A.,  i.  74,  and  note. 
Patriotism,  ii.  4  (note),  ii.  144. 
Peebles  v.  Plainstanes.     (See  Scott.) 
Penelope  and  her  servants  (see  Homer,  Od.  xxii.),  ii.  102. 
Penrith,  letter  from,  i.  147. 
"Percy's  Reliques"  quoted,  i.  77  (note). 
Permanence,  the  blessing  of  a  fixed  life,  ii.  101. 


I 


INDEX.  237 

Perseus,  i.  163. 

Perugino,  i.  44  (note),  117,  120,  note,  aud  121. 

Peter,  St.,ii.  8. 

Petroleum,  ii.  136. 

Pharpar  and  Abana,  ii.  10. 

Phidias  and  Titian,  i.  142,  162. 

(pfj(xd6G3,  ii.  178. 

"Pickwick"  referred  to,  ii.  97. 

Pictures, — and  artists,  letters  on,  i.  Ill;  arrangement  of  in  a  gallery,  i,  42 
43,50;  cleaning  of,  i.  41;  galleries,  fatigue  of  visiting,  i.  42,  51;  glazin. 
of,  i.  41,  47,  48;  arc  great  books,  i.  48,  49 (note),  69,  103;  London  atmo> 
phere,  effect  of  on,  i.  38;  modern  ai)preciation  of,  i.  55'  novelty  of  a 
purpose  in,  i.  69;  popular  idea  of,  i.  73;  preservation  of,  i.  39,  49;  restora 
tion  of,  i.  47;  purchase  of,  i.  55;  common  tendency  of,  i.  72;  tone  left 
"by  time  on,  i.  39:  touches  on,  value  of  la-^t,  i.  47;  must  be  understood 
as  well  as  seen,  i.  70;  value  of  studies  for,  i.  52;  vanity  in  possessmg. 
i.  127;  worth  buying,  worth  seeing,  i.  42,  48,  92.  (See  also  National 
Gallery.) 

Pictures  referred  to,  see  National  Gallery,  Louvre,  and  under  the  names  of 
artists. 

Piedmont,  a  view  of,  ii.  11. 

•*  Pilgrim's  Progress"  referred  to,  i.  66. 

Pisa,  ii.  117. 

Plato  quoted,  i.  16,  183;  ii.  206;  and  justice,  ii.  53. 

"  Plight,"  ii.  178. 

Plummer,  John,  letter  on  "  Supply  and  Demand,"  ii.  43,  44  (note). 

Po,  delta  of,  ii.  116;  embankments  for,  ii.  112. 

Pocock,  Mr.  T.,  ii.  140. 

Poetry,  disregarded  in  this  age,  i.  18;  and  painting  allied,  i.  19;  principles 
of  criticism  of ,  ii.  169;  better  read  than  recited,  ii.  180;  requisites  for 
enjoyment  of,  1.18;  of  Turner's  pictures,  ib. 

Poets,  modern,  ii.  171  (note). 

Pointsmen,  under-payment  of,  ii.  88. 

Poland  and  Russia,  ii.  16. 

Pole,  (Greffrey,  his  "  Xenophon,"  ii.  102  (note). 

Political  Economy,  list  of  letters  on,  ii.  35;  aud  morality,  how  connected. 
11.  42,  43;  primal  fallacy  of  modern,  ii.  65;  liuskin,  3Ir.,  and  his  defini- 
tion of,  ii.  83  (84-87);  scope  of  his  economy,  ii.  99;  shelter  the  first 
question  in,  ii.  105,  106;  true  and  false,  ii.  99. 

Politics,  list  of  letters  on,  ii.  1;  bewilderment  of  >Ir.  Ruskin  at,  ii.  3;  the 
path  in,  ii.  7,  8;  tone  of  modern,  ii,  14;  in  youth,  ii.  141. 

Pompeii,  ii.  116. 

Pope's  "Odyssey"  (piotcd,  ii.  169,  and  note. 

Poplar,  arti.sans  of,  emigration,  ii.  86,  87  (note). 

Porterage,  ii.  136,  138. 

Portrait-painters,  their  ignorance  of  landscape,  i.  16. 


238  INDEX. 

Pottery,  ii.  139. 

Poussin,  Gaspar,  i.  3,  7;  his  "Sacrifice  of  Isaac,"  1.  3. 

"        Nicholas,  i.  4. 
Powers,  for  labor,  order  of  their  employ,  ii.  134;  of  a  nation — dependent 
on  what,  ii.  25. 

Poynter,  Mr.,  R.  A.,  at  Kensington,  i.  100,  and  note. 

Prayer,  obedience  the  best,  ii.  143. 

Pre-Raphaelitism,  etc.,  list  of  letters  on,  i.  58;  choice  of  features  by,  i.  63, 
64;  conceits  of,  i.  77,  and  note;  drapery  of,  i.  63;  flesh-painting  of,  i. 
65;  growth  of,  i.  74;  labor  of  Pre-Raphaelite  pictures,  i.  68;  Liverpool 
and,  i.  73;  meaning  of  the  word,  i.  61,  and  note;  perspective  of  the 
Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,  i.  62;  probable  success  of,  i.  66;  religious 
tendencies  of  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,  i.  60,  66;  respective  value  of 
Pre-Raphaelite  and  other  work,  i.  74,  76;  want  of  shade  in  Pre- 
Raphaelite  work,  i.  66;  Pre-Raphaelite  work,  true  and  false,  i.  70. 

Price,  dependent  on  labor,  ii.  55,  60;  a  just,  ii.  106  (note);  determinable,  li. 
61 ;  allows  for  necessary  labor,  ii.  56;  and  value,  ii.  39,  64. 

Principle,  the  sense  of,  how  blunted,  i.  8. 

Property,  distribution  of,  ii.  67,  68;  principles  of ,  ii.  71;  loss  of  in  war,  ii. 
32,  38. 

Proteus,  character  of  Shakespeare's,  i.  64. 

Prout,  i.  63  (note).     (See  Ruskin,  Mr.,  "Notes  on  Prout  and  Hunt.") 

Provence,  winds  of,  ii.  135. 

"  Protestant,"  ii.  140. 

Protestantism,  remarks  on,  ii.  3,  4;  aspect  of,  at  home  and  abroad,  ii.  11; 
hypocrisy  of,  ii.  4;  of  Italians,  French,  and  Austrians,  ii.  5. 

Protests,  usclcssness  of,  ii.  17. 

Protractor,  the  use  of  the,  i.  181  (note),  184. 

Prussia,  Frederick  William  IV.  of,  ii.  7  (note).  (See  also  Franco-Prussian 
war.) 

Public,  the,  defined,  i.  15;  their  judgment  in  art,  i.  15;  and  in  other  mat- 
ters, i.  17;  their  ignorance  of  nature,  i.  17;  Frederick  Walker,  how 
affected  by,  i.  122. 

Public  Institutions  and  the  National  Gallery,  list  of  letters  on,  i.  36.  (See 
National  Gallery,  British  Museum.) 

Pullen,  Mr.  F.  W.,  Letter  to  on  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  170  (note). 

Punishment,  ii.  134. 

Quarles  Harris*  port,  ii.  66. 
Quebec,  emigration  to,  h.  87. 

Rabbah,  ii.  174. 

Radelzky,  ii.  — ;  his  character,  ii.  5. 

Railways,  list  of  letters  on,  ii.  77;  accidents,  ii.  88,  89;  doubling  of  lines,  ii. 
88,  89;  at  Dulwich,  ii.  97;  economy,  ii.  83;  investment  in,  ii.  81;  man- 
agement of,  ii.  82;  ownership  of,  ii.  81-83;  payment  of  pointsmen,  ii. 
83,  88;  stations,  decoration  of,  ii.  88,  89. 


INDEX.  339 

Rainbows,  reflection  of  in  water,  i.  201. 

Raphael,  1.  43,  75;  distinction  in  art  before  and  after,  i.  62;  pictures  of  in 

the  Louvre,  i.  49;  in  the  National  Gallery,  i.  47;  restored  by  David 

and  Vernet,  ib. 
Rationalism,  modern,  and  the  Liber  Studionim,  i.  97  (note). 
Ranch,  Christian,  ii.  17,  18  (note). 
Reader,  The,  Letters  in — 

(November  12,  1864)  "The  Conformation  of  the  Alps,"  i.  173, 

(November  26  1864)  "  Concerning  Glaciers,"  i.  175. 

(December   3,  1864)  "  English  v.  Alpine  Geology,"  i.  181. 

(December  10,  1864)  "Concerning  Hydrostatics,"  i.  185. 

Letters  and  articles,  etc.,  referred  to:  by  "  M.  A.  C"  and  "  G.  M.,"  i.  185  (note); 

Jukes,  Mr.,  i.  181  (note),  182  (note),  1^4  (note),  185  (note);  Murchison,  Sir  R, 

i.  173  (note);  "Tain  Caimbeul,"  i.  175  (note). 

Real,  the,  and  the  ideal,  not  opposed,  i.  7,  and  note. 

Rebekah,  ii.  174. 

Recitations,  Letter  on,  ii.  180. 

Red  Prince,  the,  ii.  112. 

Reflections  in  water,  letter  on,  i.  191;  two  kinds  of,  L  195  (note);  lines  of 

moonlight  on  the  sea,  i.  193;  of  rainbows,  i.  201. 
Reformation,  ii.  133;  instruments  of,  ib.  134 
Reform  Bill,  1867,  ii.  133. 

Religion  and  mythology,  i.  118;  and  science,  i.  133. 
Rembrandt,  i.  13,  28,  115  (note). 

Rendu's  Glaciers  of  Savoy — letter  on  Forbes  in,  i.  187. 
Repair  of  buildings,  ii.  138. 

Republicanism  v.  Monarchy  in  the  Franco-Prussian  war,  ii.  40. 
Restoration,  modern,  letter  on,  i.  157;  impossible,  i.  153;  in  Italy,  i.  170. 
Reverence,  a  mark  of  high  intellect,  i.  189. 
Review-writing,  ii.  166. 
Reynolds,  Sir  Joshua,  effect  of  gas  on  his  pictures,  i.  99;  grace  of,  ii.  34 

(note);  speed  of,  i.  112;  vehicles  used  by,  i.  98;  Mr.  Ruskin's  article  on, 

ii.  18  (note). 
Rheims  Cathedral,  i.  154. 

Rhine,  embankments  for  the,  ii.  112;  foul  water  of  the,  i.  195  (note). 
Rhone,  the,  ii.  112. 
Ribbesford  Church,  i.  158. 
Ricardo's  "Political  Economy,"  ii.  80. 
Rich  and  Poor,  money  how  spent  and  made  by,  ii.  98-104. 
Richmond,  George,  R.A.,  ii.  170;  Professor  W.  B.,  i.  170. 
Rivers,  Italian,  ii.  Ill  seqq.     (See  Roman  Inundation  letters.) 
Roadmaking,  ii.  138. 
Roads,  who  should  own,  ii.  119,  120. 
Robert  le  Diable,  opera  of,  ii.  17. 

Rogers'  "Italy,"  i.  83;  Poems,  i.  82.  93;  his  old  servant,  i.  104. 
Roland,  a,  needed  by  France,  ii.  42;  for  one's  Oliver,  ii.  70. 


240  IKDEX. 

Roman  inundations,  list  of  letters  on,  ii.  157. 

Roman  race,  the  qualities  of  the,  ii.  117. 

Rome,  and  the  floods,  ii.  116. 

Rose,  Society  of  the,  ii.  191 ;  the  heraldic  sign  on  Mr.  Ruskin's  books,  ib. 

Ross,  Sir  William,  A.R.A.,  i.  62. 

Rosse,  microscopes  of  Lord,  i.  94. 

Rossetti,  i.  74,  ii.  166. 

Rossini,  ii.  194. 

Rotterdam,  cleanness  of,  ii.  120. 

Rouen  Cathedral,  i.  154. 

Royal  Institution,  Dr.  Liebreich's  lecture  at.  1.  154,  and  note. 

"  Mr.  Ruskin's  lecture  on  *'The  Alps"  at,  i.  174  (note). 

"  Mr.  Ruskin's  lecture  on  "Verona"  at,  ib. 

Rubens,  advantageous  condition  in  which  to  see  his  pictures,  i.  39;  charac- 
teristics as  an  artist,  i.  39;  his  landscapes,  i.  13;  his  reply  to  A.  Jans- 
sens,  i.  14  (note);  pictures,  at  Antwerp,  Malines,  Cologne,  i.  39;  "Judg- 
ment of  Paris,"  i.  44,  and  note;  "Peace  and  War,"  i.  39. 

Rules,  good  and  bad,  ii.  89,  90. 

Ruskin,  :\Ir.,  antipathies  of,  ii.  183;  an  antiquary,  i.  153;  art-teaching  by 
correspondence  approved  by,  i.  32;  art-work,  how  first  begun,  i.  180; 
Austrian  friend  of,  at  Venice,  ii.  6;  at  Bellinzona,  ii.  117;  bewildered 
by  modern  politics,  ii.  3;  and  the  "Bibliography  of  R.,"  ii.  190;  his 
books,  ii.  164  {see  below,  books  of,  quoted);  his  books  read  for  the 
sound  of  the  words,  i.  161;  botany,  notes  on,  i.  69,  204,  ii.  183;  castles, 
his  love  of,  i.  147,  149,  151  (note);  changes  residence,  and  why,  i.  156; 
charity  of,  i.  152,  ii.  139,  186;  conscience  hereditary  to,  ii.  69;  a  con- 
servative, i.  152,  153,  ii.  31;  and  Copley  Fielding,  i.  192;  criticism, — 
principles  of  his,  i.  190;  rarely  replies  to,  i.  3,  88,  ii.  174; — crossing- 
sweepers  of,  ii.  120  (note);  diagram  of  Alpine  aiguilles,  i.  186;  dispirited, 
ii.  188;  drawing  of  St.  Marks,  Venice,  i.  161;  excuses  from  correspond- 
ence, ii.  186;  his  father, — business  of,  ii.  87,  and  note,  102,  103;  an 
Edinburgh  boy,  ii.  184;— Forbes'  gratitude  to,  i.  187  (note);  fortune  of, 
ii.  102,  103;  gardener  of,  ii.  140;  geology,  knowledge  and  early  love  of, 
i.  180,  li.  172;  geological  work  amongst  the  Alps,  1. 173;  Griggs,  Matilda, 
and,  ii.  186;  Guthrie,  Dr.,  and,  ii.  184;  Harrison,  Mr.  W.  H.,  and,  ii. 
192;  Hartz  minerals  purchased  by,  ii.  58;  Holyoake,  Mr.,  and,  ii.  73, 
74;  illness  in  1878,  i.  160,  and  note;  "inconsistency"  of,  i.  25  (note). 
ii.;  influence  of  on  architecture,  i.  154  seqq.,  157;  insanity,  a  tender 
point  with,  ii.  131;  investment  in  house  property,  ii.  106;  investment 
in  railways— "never  held  a  rag  of  railroad  scrip,"  li.  82:  Irving.  Mr., 
and,  ii.  179  (note);  Italy,  knowledge  of,  ii.  14,  and  the  Italian  question, 
ii.  3  seqq.;  lectures,  refusal  to  give,  ii.  15,  and  note,  124;  lectures  at 
Westminster  Architectural  Museum,  ii.  174  (note);  Lowe.  Mr.,  and 
(letter),  ii.  189;  at  Naples,  ii.  116;  natural  history,  love  of,  i.  204;  news- 
papers little  read  by,  ii.  10;  at  Oxford,  ii.  172,  188;  resigns  professor- 
ship, i.  133;  political  economy  of,  i.  180.  ii.  84,  99,  100  (sec  s.v.);  publi- 


INDEX.  241 

cation  of  books,  ii.  163  seqq.;  as  a  railway  traveller,  ii.  82;  range  of 
work,  ii.  188;  religious  tone  of  his  writings,  i.  60,  and  note;  restoration, 
horror  of  modern,  i.  153,  157,  159,  160;  rich,  moderately,  ii.  67;  science, 
love  of,  i.  132,  180;  servants  of,  ii.  93;  strikes,  proposal  us  to,  li.  65 
(note);  a  Tory,  i.  152,  153;  Turner,  K.'s  insight  for  his  work,  i.  106; 
called  mad  for  praising  Turner,  i.  106;  arranges  the  Turner  bequest,  i. 
81,  83,  84,  and  note,  86,  88,  98,  100;  executor  of  Turner's  will,  i.  81;  love 
of  Turner's  pictures,  i.  10;  Thornbury's  "  Liie  of  Turner"  criticised 
by,  i.  107;  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  and,  i.  162.  169;  Ruskin  Society,  i.  170 
(note),  ii.  191;  Utopian  home,  ii.  119;  residence  in  Venice,  i.  87;  wish 
to  buy  "  Veronu"  (slc  Verona),  i.  152. 
Ruskin,  Mr.,  books  of,  quoted  or  referred  to: — 


"  Academy  Notes,"  i.  67  (note),  76  (note),  117;  ii.  23  (note). 

"  A  Joy  for  Ever,"  i.  25  (note).  102  (note),  189 (note);  ii.  156  (note),  158. 

"  Aratra  Pentelioi,"  ii.  125  (note). 

"Ariadne  Flurentina,"'  i.  105  (note),  114  (note). 

"  Bibliotheoa  Pastorum,"  vol.  i.,  ii.  4  (note),  102  (note),  141  (note). 

"  Cestus  of  Aglaia,""  ii.  99  (note). 

"  Crown  of  Wild  Olive,"'  ii.  23,  60  (note),  157. 

"  Deucalion,"  i.  180  (note). 

"Eagle's  Nest,"  ii.  125  (note),  140. 

"  Education  in  Art,"  i.  25  (note). 

"  Elements  of  Drawing,"  i.  95;  ii.  165  (note). 

"  Essay's  on  Political  Economy,"  see  below,  "  Munera  Pulveris." 

Evidence  before  National  Gallery  Commission,  1857,  i.  48  (note),  84  (note). 

"  Examples  of  Venetian  Architecture,"  i.  157  (note). 

"  Fiction  Fair  and  Foul,"  ii.  97  (note). 

"Fors  Clavigera,"  i.  151,  and  note,  160  (note),  168,  169,  170;    ii.  00  (note),  70 

(note),  72,  106  (note),  126  (note),  130,  164  (note),  187, 189. 
"  Giotto  and  his  Works  in  Padua,"  i.  25  (note). 
Holbein,  article  on,  ii.  12  (note). 
"  Home  and  its  Economies,"  ii.  144  (note). 
Lectures  on  Architecture  and  Painting,  i.  22  (note),  107  (note). 
Lectures  on  Art.  ii.  125.  156  (note). 
Lecture,  on  Forms  of  Stratified  Alps,  i.  174  (note). 

on  Verona  and  its  ruins,  ii.  113  (note). 

Letters  on  the  Lord's  Prayer,  ii.  142. 

"Modem  Painters,"  i.   3,  4  (note),  4  (note).  5  (note),  7,  8  (note),  40,  60  (note),  62 

(note),  67  (note),  101  (note),  107  (note),  108  (note),  155,  174,  186,  191  (note),  193 

(note):  ii.  127,  165. 
"Munera  Pulveris."  ii.  44  (note).  71,  72,  84,  and  note,  89,  226,  262  (note). 
"My  First  Editor."  ii.  192  (note). 
Notes  on  Criminal  Cla.<vses,  ii.  131  seqq. 
Notes  on  Prout  and  Hunt.  ii.  (note). 
Oxford  Lectures,  ii.  125. 

"  Politi(>al  Economy  of  Art:"  see  above,  "  A  Joy  for  Ever." 
Pre-Raphaelitism.  i.  12,  a5  (note). 
"Queen  of  the  Air,"  ii   171.201. 

"Sesame  and  Lilies."  i.  60  (note);  ii.  163  (note),  171  (note). 
"  Seven  Lamps  of  Architecture,"  1.  60  (note). 

"  Stones  of  Venice,"  i.  157  (note),  161 ;  ii.  175  (note).  1&4  (note),  192  (note) 
"  Time  and  Tide,"  i\.  65,  ia5. 


242  IKDEX. 

Toimer  pamphlets,  Catalogues  of  Sketches  and  Drawings,  i.  84,  and  note,  88 
(note),  101  (note). 

"  "  Notes,  1857,  86  (note),  92,  and  note,  102  (note),  204. 

"  "  Report,  i.  52  (note),  54,  and  note,  88  (note). 

"Two  Paths,"!.  88,  9.5. 
"  Unto  this  Last,"  ii.  72  (note). 
"  Val  d'Amo,"  i.  114  (note);  ii.  125, 

Russia,  England,  and  India,  ii.  31. 

"  S,"  letter  on  capital  from,  ii.  83  (and  note),  84. 

Saint  Bernard,  dogs  of,  ii.  11. 

St.  Elmo,  ii.  116. 

St.  George,  i.  162;  Company  or  guild  of,  i.  169  (note),  190;  fund,  ii.  120; 

letters  on,  187  (note);  museum  of,  i.  163,  ii.  73,  126;  schools  of,  ii.  146; 

Society  of  the  Rose  not  to  take  name  of,  ii.  191. 
St.  James  of  the  Rialto,  i.  165,  and  note. 
St.  Jean  d'Acre  pillars,  i.  166. 
"  St.  Lawrence,"  emigration  in  the,  li.  87. 
St.  Michael,  i.  162. 
St.  Mark's,  Venice,  circular  relating  to,  i.  159;  letters  on,  i.  169  (note),  170; 

antiquity  of,  i.  161,  162;   architecture  of,  i.  162;  bill-posters  on,  i.  168; 

hit  off  it,  at  Brant  wood,  i.  167;  photographs  of,  i.  164;  restoration  of 

south  facade,  i.  168,  and  note;  stability  of,  i.  166,  169;  subscriptions 

for,  i.  163,  169  (note). 
St.  Paul  and  Justice,  ii.  53. 
St.  Paul's,  Charity  children  singing  at,  ii.  149. 
Sainte  Chapelle,  the,  i.  136,  153,  154. 
Salamanca,  battle  of,  ii.  30. 
Salvation,  the  Light  of  the  hope  of,  i.  69. 
Salvator  Rosa,  i.  15;  his  "Mercury  and  the  Woodman,"  i.  4. 
Sancho,  ii.  97. 

Sardinia,  position  of  in  1859,  ii.  3,  6. 
Savoy,  cession  of,  ii.  19,  and  note. 
Scarlet,  the  purest  color,  ii.  155. 
Schaffhausen,  letter  from,  ii.  13. 
Scholarship,  result  of  English,  ii.  98. 
Schools  (see  Education,  St.  George). 
Science,  list  of  letters  on,  i.  171 ;  connection  of  the  different  sciences,  i,  132 

(note);  what  it  includes,  i.  30;  growth  of,  i.  32,  132, 134;  and  religion, 

i.  133;  use  of,  i.  133. 
Science  of  Life,"  "  The,  letters  in,  ii.  143,  149. 
Scotch,  ballads,  i.  76  (note);  "craigs,"  i.  146;  people,  religious  tone  of,  11. 

3,  4,  7. 
Scotsman,  The,  letters  in — 

(July  20, 1859)  "  The  Italian  Question,"  ii.   3. 

(    "    2.3,     "  )       "         "  "  ii.    8. 

(Aug.  6,    "  )       "         '•  "  ii.  13. 

(Nov.  10, 1873)  "  Mr.  Ruskin  and  Prof.  Hodgson,"  ii.  44. 

(    "     18,    "  )  "  "  "  ii.  46. 


I 


INDEX.  243 

Scotsman,  The,  referred  to,  i.  74  (note). 

Scott,  Sir  Gilbert,  desigu  for  Foreign  Otlice,  i.  99. 

,    Sir  Waller,  books  of,  referred  to — 

"  The  Abbot,"  chap.  xvi.  ('*  The  monks  of  Melrose  made  good  kail,**  al.so  quoted 

in  the  introduction  to  "  The  Monastery"),  i.  141. 
"The  Antiquary"  (Kairservice),  ii.  97. 
"Lady  of  the  Liike,"  canto  v.  st.  x.  quot**(l,  i.  181. 
"  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel,"  canto  ii.  st.  viii.  quoted,  i.  141. 
"Redgauntlet,"  Letter  xiii.  (Peebles  v.  Plainstau,es),  i.  184. 
"  Rob  Roy"  (carefu'  Mattie),  ii.  97. 
"  Waverley"  referred  to,  ii.  123  (note). 

,  Mr.  W.  B.,  ii.  165;  reviews  Mr.  Tyrwhitt's  "Sketching  Club,"  ib. 

Sculpture,  in  architecture,  i.  126,  137  seqq.\  of  hair,  i.  143,  ii.  12;  portrait 

statues,  i.  140. 
Sea,  the,  ii.  173;  color  of,  i.  196;  light  and  shadow  on,  i.  194  scqq. ;  southern 

and  northern  seas,  ii.  178. 
Sedan,  battle  of,  ii.,  31,  33. 
Seine-series,  Turner's,  i.  82,  101. 
Self-interest,  ii.  7,  48,  55. 

Sempach,  ii.  4,  and  note;  battle  of,  i.  182,  and  note. 
Serf -economy  in  America,  ii.  21. 
Servants  and  Houses,  list  of  letters  on,  ii.  90;  education  of,  ii.  100;  facilities 

for  leaving  places,  ii.  101;   good,  how  to  secure,  ii.  93;   kindness  to 

means  care,  ii.  94;  rarity  of  good,  ii.  93,  and  note;  and  masters,  ii.  97; 

must  be  permanent  to  be  good,  ii.  95,  101 ;  Mr.  Ruskin's  experience  of, 

ii.  95. 
Service,  value  of  self-service,  ii.  96. 
Sexes,  relation  of  the,  li.  147. 
Shadow  in  distant  effect,  i.  194  seqq. ;  on  water,  i.  198;  impossible  "on  clear 

water,  near  the  eye,"  i.  192  seqq. 
Shakespeare,  his  mission  and  work,  i.  22  (note);  notes  on  a  word  in,  ii. 

176,  177;  Society,  ib. ;  quoted  or  referred  to — 

"  As  You  Like  It,"  Act  2,  so.  3  (Old  Adam\  ii.  97. 

"        Act  2,  sc.  7  ("  motleys  the  only  wear"),  ii.  157, 
"  Coriolanus,"  Act  3,  sc.  1  ("mutable,  rank-scented  many"),  i.  38. 
"  Hamlet,"  Act  5,  sc.  1  ("The  cat  will  mew,"  etc.),  U.  97. 
"  Julius  Caesar,"  Act  2,  sc.  1  ("  And  yon  grey  lines,"  etc.),  iL  17G. 
"  Mea.sure  for  Measure"  (Lord  Angelo),  ii.  144. 
"Merchant  of  Venice."  ii.  57,  i.  IG.'J,  ii.  179. 
"  Merry  "Wives  of  Windsor,"  i.  118. 

"Mid.summer  Night's  Dream,"  ii.  5,  Act  1,  sc.  1,  i.  60,  Gl  (note). 
"  Romeo  and  Juliet,"  Act  2,  sc.  4  ("  My  fan,  Pet«r"),  U.  38. 
"Taming  of  the  Shrew"  (Grumio),  ii.  97,  178. 

"         ••  "  Act  2,  sc.  1  ("Katharine's  frets"). 

"Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  Act  2,  sc.  4  ("  As  rich  in  having,"  etc.),  1.  (54. 

"  "  (Launce),  a.  97. 

Shallow,  Justice,  his  theology  of  death,  i.  118. 
Sheepshanks  collection  at  Kensington,  i.  98  (note). 


244 


INDEX. 


Sheffield,  art  impossible  in,  ii.  126;  ironwork  at,  ii.  127;  Museum,  ii.  73 
(note),  i.  163;  Western  Park  at,  opened,  ii.  126  (note);  strikes  at,  ii. 
106. 

Sheffield  Daily  Telegraph  (Sept.  7,  1875),  St.  George's  Museum,  ii.  126. 

Sheffield  Independent  (March  8,  1880),  Mr.  Holyoake  on  St.  George's 
Museum,  ii.  73. 

Shelley,  quoted  to  illustrate  Turner,  i.  20;  his  "  Cloud,"  ii.  180. 

Shenstone  quoted,  i.  72,  and  note. 

Shepherd,  Mr.  R.  H.,  two  letters  on  the  Bibliography  of  Ruskin,  to,  ii.  190. 

Shoeburyness,  ii.  114. 

Siena,  Fount  of  Joy  at,  ii.  118. 

Sienese,  qualities  of  the  race,  ii.  117. 

Simmons,  W.  H.,  engraver  of  "Light  of  the  World,"  i.  67  (note). 

Sinai,  the  desert  of,  ii.  5. 

Singing  for  children,  ii.  149. 

Sire,  meaning  of,  i.  145. 

"  Sixty  years  ago"  (letter  in  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  Jan.  30,  1868),  ii.  123. 

Slave  markets  in  ^layfair,  ii.  21. 

Slavery  and  emancipation,  ii.  21,  22;  and  liberty,  ii.  98,  99;  and  sonship, 
ii.  93,  94,  96. 

Smith,  Mr.  Collingwood,  on  water  colors,  i.  104  (note). 

Smitli,  Sydney,  memoirs  quoted  ("Bunch"),  ii.  96  (note). 

Smoke,  no  art  in  midst  of,  ii.  126. 

Socialist,  The  (Nov.,  1877),  letter  on  the  "Principles  of  Property"  in,  ii.  71. 

Society,  of  Arts,  i.  52;  of  Artists,  Sheffield,  ii.  181;  Ashmolean,  1.  202; 
New  Shakespeare,  ii,  176,  177;  for  the  Prevention  of  Cruelty  to  Ani- 
mals, Mr.  Ruskin  at,  ii.  128  (note) ;  Ruskin  Society  (of  the  Rose),  ii. 
191 ;  Science  Association,  Mr.  Ruskin  at,  ii.  65  (note). 

Solferino,  ii.  3  (note),  31,  33. 

Solomon,  ii.  141,  173;  "seals  of  Solomon"  (Suleyman),  see  Arabian  Nights. 

Solomon,  Mr.  A.,  his  "Waiting  for  the  Verdict,"  i.  73  (note). 

Son,  relation  of,  to  father,  ii.  145. 

Sonship  and  slavery,  ii.  96-98. 

Sorrento,  i.  203. 

Soult,  Marshal,  collection  of,  1.  87  (note). 

Soutliey's  Colloquies  quoted,  i.  21  (note). 

Spain,  oppressed  by  Spaniards,  ii.  6. 

Sparkes,  i.  100  (note). 

Spencer,  Mr.  Herbert,  quoted,  i.  194  (note),  ii.  144  (note). 

Sport,  field,  ii.  127. 

Sprat,  venture  a,  to  catch  a  herring,  ii.  41. 

Standard,  The,  letter  "Mr.  Ruskin  and  Mr.  Lowe"  (Aug.  28,  1877),  ii.  189; 
article  on  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  168. 

Stanfielvl,  i.  23,  192;  illustrated  by  Campbell,  i.  20;  water-painting  by, 
i.  198. 

Statues,  commemorative,  modern  use  of,  i.  140. 


I 


INDEX.  245 

Steam,  to  be  employed  after  muscular  power,  ii.  87,  135. 

Stones,  pressure  of,  in  water,  i.  177,  186. 

Stothard,  engraving  of  design  by,  in  "  Rogers's  Poems,"  i.  93. 

Strasburg,  ruin  of,  in  Franco-Prussian  war,  ii.  25. 

Street,  Mr.,  influenced  by  Mr.  liuskin,  i.  156;  his  New  Law  Courts,  i.  156; 

and  St.  Mark's,  i.  170. 
Streets,  state  of  London,  ii.  110. 
Strikes,  ii.  42,  43;  letter  "Strikes  v.  Arbitration,"  ii.  48;  at  Cramlington, 

ii.  106,  and  note;  Mr.  Kuskin's  proposal  as  to,  ii,  65  (note);  at  Sheffield, 

ii.  106;  in  Staffordshire,  ii.  39. 
Stucco,  ii.  101. 
Sunrise,  rarely  seen,  ii.  177. 
Supply  and  Demand,  letters  on,  ii.  3d  st^qq.,  43  seqq.,  beneficial  supply,  ii. 

43;  law  of,  ii.  81,  84,  93,  94,  105;  Mr.  Ruskiu  and,  ii.  99,  100. 
Swift,  quoted,  ii.  167. 
Swiss,  the  people  of  Bellinzona,  ii.  117;  the  liberties  of  Europe  and,  i.  182; 

Protestantism,  ii.  3-5. 
Sydenham,  and  railway  complaints,  ii.  84,  and  note. 
Syro-Phoenicia,  the  woman  of.  ii.  174. 

"Tain  Caimbeul,"  letter  in  Reader,  i.  175  (note). 

Taylor,  the,  trial,  ii.  130,  and  note. 

Telford,  "Ruskin,  T.,  and  Donecq,"  ii.  60  (note). 

Tell,  William,  ii.  3.  and  note;  opera  of,  ii.  194. 

Tempera-painting,  determined  by  Angelico,  i.  118. 

Temple,  Rev.  F.  (Bishop  of  Exeter),  i.  25  (note),  31. 

Tennyson,  quoted:    "Mariana,"  i.  60  (note);    "In  Memoriam,"  i.    179; 

"Enid,"  ii.  100;  "Break,  break,  etc.,"  ii.  178;  mentioned,  ii.  183  (note). 
Territory,  extent  of,  ii.  24. 
Thackeray,  Miss,  "The  Chaplain's  Daughter"  referred  to,  i.  120,  121  (note); 

"Jack  the  Giant  Killer,"  ib. 
Thames,  the,  i.  183;  its  commerce,  i.  165  (note);  its  mud,  ii.  73. 
Theatre,  the,  letter,  "At  the  Play,"  ii.  185.    (See  Drama.) 
Theatre,  The,  letter  in,  "  The  Merchant  of  Venice,"  ii.  179. 
Thorburn,  i.  62. 

Thornbury,  Walter,  "Life  of  Turner,"  i.  108. 
Tiber,  inundations,  ii.  Ill,  116,  118. 
Ticino,  inundations,  ii.  113,  117. 
J'tmes,  The  letters  in: — 

(January  7, 1847)  Danger  to  the  National  Gallery,  I.  37. 

(May  13,  la-jl)  The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,  i.  57. 

(May  30,  1351)  The  Pre-Raphaelite  Brethren,  i.  63. 

(December  29, 1H.V2)  The  National  fiallery,  i.  45. 

(May  5,  ia54)  "The  Li^ht  of  the  World,"  i.  67. 

(May  25, 1854)  "  The  Awakening  Conscience,"  i.  71. 

(October  28,  ia56)  The  Turner  Bequest,  i.  81. 

(Julj  9, 1857)  The  Turner  Bequest  and  the  National  Gallerj-,  i.  86, 


346  lifDEX. 

(March  29, 1859)  The  sale  of  Mr.  Windus'  pictures,  ii.  185. 
(October  21, 1859)  The  Turner  Gallery  at  Kensington,  i.  98. 
(October  24, 1862)  Oak  Silkworms,  ii.  158. 
(October  8,  1863)  The  Depreciation  of  Gold,  ii.  37. 
(January  27, 1866)  The  Briti.sh  Museum,  i.  52. 
(January  24, 1871)  Turners  False  and  True,  i.  106. 
(June  6, 1874)  The  Value  of  Lectures,  ii.  124. 
(January  20,  1876)  The  Frederick  Walter  Exhibition,  i.  116. 
(April  25, 1878)  Copies  of  Turner's  Drawings,  i.  105. 
(February  12, 1876)  Despair  (extract),  ii.  124  (note). 
(February  2, 1880)  The  Purchase  of  Pictures,  i.  55. 

Articles,  etc. ,  referred  to : — 

Critique  on  early  Pre-Raphaelite  works,  i.  59  (note). 

"  Difficulties  of  NeutraUty,"  Letter,  ii.  26  (note).    And  see  notes  to  above-named 
letters. 

Tintoret,  i.  49,  75,  96,  112;  "Susannah  and  the  Elders,"  i.  50,  and  note. 

Titian,  i.  24,  28,  42,  43,  49,  51,  75,  96,  106,  112,  117,  142;  ii.  214;  his  "Bac- 
chus and  Ariadne,"  i.  40,  54,  and  note. 

Toccia,  inundation  of  the,  ii.  113. 

Tombs,  pompous,  i.  140. 

Tour,  La,  ii.  11,  12. 

Townshend,  Lord,  letter  by,  on  the  Circassian  exodus,  ii.  17,  and  note. 

Traceries,  not  to  be  copied,  i.  159. 

Trade,  the  true  dignity  of,  ii.  70,  and  note. 

Training,  moral  and  athletic,  ii.  145. 

Translation,  the,  of  words,  ii.  175. 

Trevelyan,  Sir  W.  C,  i.  133,  and  note. 

Trial  and  fate,  the  laws  of,  i.  125-6. 

Trollope,  Anthony,  on  field  sports,  ii.  128  (note). 

Tunbridge  Wells,  education  meeting  at,  123. 

Turin,  ii.  11, 12. 

Turner,  J.  W.  M.,  list  of  letters  on,  i.  80  seqq. ;  his  pictures  ill  seen  in  the 
Academy,  i.  20,  21;  bequest  to  the  nation,  i.  50,  and  note,  81,  100;  his 
best  work  in  gray,  i.  96;  his  best  work  his  modern  work  (1843),  i.  23 
(note) ;  change  in  price  and  value  of  his  pictures,  ii.  41 ;  character  of, 
i.  107;  Claude  challenged  by,  i.  46,  and  note;  the  Turner  collection,  i. 
54,  and  note;  copies  of,  105,  and  note;  diflSculty  of  copying,  i.  95;  les- 
son in  art  of  copying,  i.  23;  his  delicacy  of  hand,  i.  95;  engravings  of, 
their  value,  i.  90;  exhibitions  at  Marlboro'  House,  i.  81,  and  note, 
88-9,  92.  98,  101;  eyesight  of  (Dr.  Liebreich  on  the),  i.  154  and  155 
(note);  "Turners"  False  and  True,  i.  106;  a  Turner  gallery,  proposals 
for,  i.  91;  Life  of,  i.  107-8;  light  and  gas,  etc.,  effect  of,  on  his  pic- 
tures, i.  83,  90,  98,  and  note,  100,  103,  105;  the  Turner  mania,  i.  16; 
mass  of  drawings  left  by,  i.  101 ;  Norton's,  Prof.,  lecture  on,  i.  86  (note), 
97  (note),  105  (note);  pencil  outlines  of,  i.  93;  poetry  and  philosophy  of 
his  pictures,  i.  11,  15,  18,  21;  pre-Raphaelitism  of,  i.  65  (note),  74;  his 
"Public,"  i.  15;  scorned  in  life,  i.  8,  11;  sea  subjects,  i.  199,  11,13 


INDEX.  247 

(note);  the  "Shakespeare"  of  painting,  i.  23,  and  note;  Shelley  com- 
pared with,  i.  20;  sketch-book  of,  i.  80  ^uote);  subtlety  of,  i.  96;  requi- 
sites for  enjoyment  of  his  work,  i.  21;  unusual  vehicles  of,  i.  82; 
Waagen's  estimate  of,  i.  11,  12,  and  note;  water-painting  by,  i.  199;  will 
quoted,  i.  46  (note). 

Turner,  J.  W.  M.,  Drawings  and  Sketches,  condition  of  at  death,  i.  90,  101 
(note);  copies  of,  105-6,  and  note;  distribution  of  among  provincial 
schools  proposed,  i.  54.  and  note,  101;  exhibitions  of,  at  Marlboro' 
House,  see  above,  at  Kensington,  i,  98,  and  note,  101;  a  perfect  ex- 
ample of  a  Turner  sketch,  95,  96,  and  note;  Iluskin's,  Mr.,  arrange- 
ment of,  i.  84,  88,  89;  report  on,  i.  52  (note),  54,  and  note,  88;  "  Turner 
Notes,"  etc.  (see  Ruskin,  Mr.). 

Pictures  and  drawings  of,  referred  to:  Alnwick  Castle,  i.  199;  "Dido 

building  Carthage,"  i.  48;  Edinburgh,  i.  101;  Egglestone  Abbey,  i.  102, 
and  note;  "  Fishermen  endeavoring  to  put  their  fish  on  board"  (Bridge- 
"water  House),  i.  11,  and  note;  Fluelen  i.  105  (note);  Fort  Bard,  i.  101; 
Harbors  of  England,  i.  82,  101;  Hornby  Castle,  i.  117;  Ivy  Bridge,  i. 
82,  101;  "Landscape  with  Cattle,"  i.  106, and  note;  Langliarne  Castle, 
i.  102,  and  note;  Liber  Studiorum,  i.  82,  86;  sale  of,  ii.  70;  Plains  of 
Troy,  i.  102,  and  note;  Richmond  series,  i.  102,  and  note;  Rivers  of 
England,  i.  101;  Rivers  of  France,  i.  82;  River  Scenery,  ih.-,  Rogers' 
Italy  and  Poems,  i.  82,  101 ;  Seine  series,  i.  101 ;  study  of  a  Cutter,  i. 
96,  and  note;  "  Sun  rising  in  a  mist,"  i.  46-  Val  d'Aosta,  i.  82;  Pictures 
of  Venice,  i.  199;  Yorkshire  series,  i.  90. 

Tuscan  army  (1859),  ii.  6. 

"Twenty  Photographs,"  review  of,  ii.  172,  and  note. 

T>Te,  the  citadel  of,  and  St.  iMark's,  i.  162. 

TjTwhitt's  "Sketching  Club,"  ii.  165. 

"  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin"  referred  to,  ii.  21. 

Vnixersity  Magazine,  The  (April,  1878),  Mr.  Ruskin's  articles  in,  ii.  192 

(note). 
Utopia,  the  people  of,  and  their  streets,  ii.  119;  Ruskin's  home  in,  ib.\  Sir 

T.  More's,  ii.  191. 
Utopianism,  ^Mr.  Ruskin's,  ii.  74,  106. 
Uwins,  Thomas,  R.A.,  knowledge  of  oil  pictures,  i.  46,  and  note;  keeper 

of  the  National  Gallery,  ib. 

Yallombrosa,  i.  184. 

Value,  intrinsic,  a  question  outside  political  economy,  ii.  39;  and  price,  ii. 

37,  65. 
"Vandalism  at  the  National  Gallery"  (a  pamphlet),  i.  37,  38  (note). 
Van  de  Velde,  i.  12;  water  painting,  i.  199. 
Van  Eyck,  i.  43,  45,  46,  and  note,  65. 
Vasari  quoted,  i.  9  (note). 
Vnudois,  the  character  and  religion  of  the,  ii.  3,  11,  12. 


348  INDEX. 

Velasquez's  "Philip  IV.  hunting  the  wild  boar,"  i.  40. 

Venice,  the  Cross  of  the  merchants  of,  i.  165;  market  of,  ib.  (note);  ruin 

of,  ii.  145;  Ruskin,  Mr.,  in,  i.  87,  157,  ii.  154;  St.  James  of  the  Rialto, 

i.  164;  see  St.  Mark's. 
Venus  of  Melos,  ii.  25. 

"  Verax,"  letters  on  National  Gallery,  i.  37  (note). 
Vernet,  Raphael  restored  by,  i.  38. 

Vernon,  Mr.  Robert,  gift  of,  to  the  National  Gallery,  i.  50,  and  note. 
Verona,  Campanile  of,  i.  169;  Mr.  Ruskin's  wish  to  buy  (see  "Political 

Economy  of  Art,"  Lect.  ii.  pp.  70-74,  reprinted  in  "A  Joy  for  Ever," 

pp.  77,  82),  i.  152,  and  note. 
Veronese,  i.  75,  96;  in  National  Gallery,  i.  46,  and  note;  "Marriage  in 

Cana,"  i.  87;  "Family  of  Darius,"  ih.,  and  note;  "Rape  of  Europa," 

i.  46  (note) ;  St.  Nicholas,  ih. ;  at  Venice,  pictures  destroyed,  i.  38. 
Verrochio,  no  picture  by,  in  National  Gallery,  i.  44  (note). 
Vice  and  heroism,  ii.  134,  135. 
Villas,  modern,  ii.  104,  105,  and  notes;  i.  156. 
"  Vindex,"  letter  on  Barry  from,  ii.  175  (note). 
Virgil  quoted,  i.  176  (note);  ii.  18,  and  note. 
Votes  for  Parliament,  ii.  141,  154. 

Waagen,  Dr.,  i.  11,  and  note,  12. 

Wages  and  labor,  ii.  56,  60;  how  determined,  ii.  63,  and  note;  and  hard- 
ship of  work,  ii.  59;  a  just  rate  of,  ii.  48,  50,  51;  "  Standard  of  "  (letter) 
ii.  65,  66,  and  see  ii.  42. 

Wakley,  Thomas,  M.P.,  i.  19,  and  note. 

Wales,  Princess  of,  "our  future  Queen,"  ii.  19. 

Walker,  Frederick,  letter  on,  i.  116;  effect  of  public  on,  ib.-,  elaborateness 
of,  i.  121;  moral  of  his  life,  i.  118,  119;  morbid  tendency  of,  i.  117; 
method  of  painting,  i.  117;  study  of  art,  i.  118;  special  pictures  by,  i. 
119  seqq.,  and  note. 

Walpole's  "  Anecdotes  of  Painting"  referred  to,  i.  14  (note). 

War,  American,  loss  of  property,  ii.  33;  English  feeling  as  to,  ii.  15-17,  19; 
"modern  warfare,"  letter  on,  ii.  29,  and  see  ii.  23. 

Ward,  Mr.  William,  copies  of  Turner,  i.  105,  and  note;  photographs 
obtainable  of,  i.  164. 

Warwick  Castle,  burning  of,  letters  on,  i.  151  seqq.,  152  seqq.;  the  king- 
maker, i.  153. 

Waste  land,  bringing  in  of,  ii.  138. 

Water,  use  of  in  labor,  ii.  135,  136;  pressure  of  stones  in,  i.  177,  186;  reflec- 
tions in,  i.  191  (note),  and  seqq. ;  of  rainbows  in,  i.  201 ;  surface  polished, 
i.  195,  197  seqq. 

Wat  T-colors,  effect  of  light,  etc.,  on,  i.  90,  91,  103,  and  note,  104;  series  of 
British  at  Kensington,  i.  98  (note);  Society  of  Painters  in,  i.  118,  166, 
201  (note). 

Waterloo,  battle  of,  ii.  30. 


INDEX.  ^9 

"W.  B.,"  letter  in  Daily  Telegraph,  ii.  99  (note). 

"  W.  C.  P.,"  letter  in  Tiuies  on  "  Neutrality,"  ii.  26  (note). 

Wealth,  definition  of,  letter  on  the,  ii.'71;  Mill  challenged  to  define,  »*. 

Weapons,  ancient  and  modern,  ii.  32. 

"Weary  Faulds,"  ii.  123,  and  note. 

Weblings,  recitation  of  the,  ii.  180. 

Wei'kly  Chronicle,  letter  "Modern  Painters"  in  the  (September  23,  1843,) 
i.  3. 

Wcller,  Sam,  ii.  97;  see  Dickens. 

West,  Benjamin,  i.  75. 

Western  Park.  Sheffield,  ii.  126  (note). 

Westminster,  the  first  Norman  Abbey,  i.  161;  Mill,  J.  S.,  M.P.  for.  ii.  20 
(note). 

"  Whinnyhills,"  ii.  123  (note). 

Whitaker's  "History  of  Richmondshire,  i.  117  (note). 

White,  Adam,  letter  on  "the  Study  of  Natural  History"  to,  i.  204. 

Whitmore,  Dr.,  report  of  Crawford  Place,  ii.  105. 

"  W.  H.  W.,"  letter  to  Daily  Telegraph  on  houses,  ii.  104,  and  note,  105. 

Wicklow  Hills,  i.  181. 

Wife,  place  of  a,  ii.  153. 

Wilkie.  Sir  David,  "The  Blind  Fiddler,"  i.  7  (note);  Burns  and,  com- 
pared, i.  20. 

Wilkinson,  Sir  Gardner,  ii.  200,  and  note. 

Williams,  Mr.  (of  Southampton),  Lecture  on  "Art-teaching  by  Correspond- 
ence," to,  i.  32. 

Wind-power,  use  of,  ii.  135. 

Windus,  Mr.  B.  J.,  sale  of  his  pictures,  ii.  185;  W.  L.,  "Burd  Helen,"  i. 
76,  77,  and  notes. 

Winkelried,  Arnold  von,  ii.  4,  and  note. 

Winsor,  Charlotte,  ii.  100  (note). 

Witness,  The,  letters  in : 

(September,  16, 1857)  "  The  Castle  Rock."  I.  145. 

(September  30,  1857)  "  Edinburgh  Castle."  i.  147. 

(March  27, 1858)  Generalization  and  the  Scotch  Pre-RaphaeHt«s.  I.  74. 

(August,  1859)  Refusal  bj-,  of  Letters  on  the  Italian  Question,  ii.  13  (note). 

Women,  list  of  letters  on  their  work  and  dress,  ii.  152;  duty  and  employ- 
ment of,  ii.  153;  modern  ideas  as  to,  ii.  153;  place  of,  ii.  145;  work  of, 
ii.  154  (note).  153  (note). 

Woodward,  Mr.,  and  the  Oxford  Museum,  i.  125  (note). 

Woolner,  Mr.,  and  the  Oxford  Museum,  i.  139. 

Words,  definition  of,  ii.  56. 

Wordsworth,  depth  of,  i.  24  (note);  his  "public,"  i.  14;  quoted,  i.  17,  18, 
24,  and  note,  148.  149;  ii.  6,  8  (note). 

Work,  the  best  unpaid,  ii.  60,  and  note;  honest  always  obtainable,  ii.  46, 
135. 


250  IKDEX. 

Work  and  Wages,  letters  on,  in  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  ii.  48-64, 
Workmen,  turned  off,  ii.  27;  training  of  for  Gothic  architecture,  i.  136. 
Works  of  art,  manufacture  of  by  poor,  ii.  139. 
World,  The  (June  9,  1875),  letter  ou  the  "Publication  of  Books,"  ii.  163; 

article,  "Ruskin  to  the  Rescue,"  ih.  (note). 
Wornum's,  R.  N.,  "  Life  of  Holbein,"  ii.  12  (note);  at  the  National  Gallery, 

i.  92,  86  (note);  Turner  drawings  arranged,  ih.  88. 
Worth,  battle  of,  ii.  31, 
"  W.  R.  G.,"  letters  of,  to  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  ii.  66-70,  and  notes. 

Xenophon's  Economist,  quoted,  ii.  102,  and  note. 

"  Y.  L.Y.,"  letter  in,  on  the  gentian,  1.  204  (note). 
Y.  M.  A.  Magazine,  letters  in: 

(September,  1879).     "  Blindness  and  Sight, ' '  ii,  139. 
(October,  1879).    "  The  Eagle's  Nest,"  ii.  140. 
(November,  1879).    "  Politics  in  York,"  ii.  141. 

Young  Men  and  Politics,  ii.  141. 

Zedekiah,  ii.  177 

Zeus,  i.  162 

Zorzi,  Count,  and  St.  Mark's,  Venice,  i.  160  (note). 

Zosima,  epitaph  on,  ii.  99. 

Zuingli,  ii.  4,  and  note. 


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